01 Above You
by Kyeian
Summary: -COMPLETE- New friends are worth keeping, no matter how hard that keeping may be. This story contains original characters -so shocking, I know-. This is the first story of "Chance or Circumstance". Rated for mature language and some content.
1. Chapter 1

**A/U**: I just wanted to say that when you see a number, like 27, it's meant to be read as "two-seven" not "twenty-seven". Also, 0 (zeros) aren't meant as "zero", they're meant as "oh"...so A0206 is "A oh two oh six"...just to differentiate why there actually are numerals in the text. That aside, I didn't get around to explaining it in this story, but the "As" of their "As model phones" stands for "active sensor" or "active scan" something along that lines. It's one of those ones that some people have and some people don't. I'm also using the concept of clusters when referring to the colonies—meaning that L-5 consists of 4 individual colonies where L-4 is 5 or 6 individual colonies.

There is a fair bit of adult language and content in this story--reader discretion is advised. I don't own Gundam Wing or any other brand name that might sneak its way into pop culture. Anyway, I'll stop rambling now and sum this all up with the note that I hope you enjoy this, I had fun writing it. -Kye

**One**

What were his perverted roommates doing now? Trowa couldn't quite muster the effort to come awake and dissect the possibly explicit words that had woke him.

"Think carpet," Wufei encouraged, his tone almost wicked.

"Think cock," Trowa retorted, rolling over.

Duo guffawed as Quatre made a slight mewing noise of confusion.

"The hell you tellin' us your fantasies for?" Wufei demanded, still highly amused as he studied the recumbent man. The rest of them were sitting together on the floor.

"Maybe it's a clue," Heero suggested, his tone darkly amused.

"You can do that research," Quatre noted.

Duo started laughing.

Trowa turned his head to look at the group of them again. Wufei and Heero on one side and Duo and Quatre on the other. Wufei and Quatre were closer to him...and they all had cups. Wufei had his insulated and portable coffee pot between them with sugar packets he'd bought and creamer Duo'd stolen from a diner...

They were all looking at him...all amused...

"He wouldn't be walking tomorrow if I did the research," Heero quipped to Quatre...who started blushing as he laughed wickedly.

Yeah...Heero would be the one not to care about sexual orientation.

Trowa pushed himself up to raise an eyebrow at the guy.

Heero laughed his happy laugh, understanding that he hadn't only gotten a rise from Quatre with that comment, even though Trowa was making a valiant effort to keep his face straight.

Wufei snickered as well, picking up his cup and looking back to Trowa.

"What are you dumbasses doing?" Trowa demanded, looking beyond them to the wall-closet behind them.

They lived in a very large studio apartment. They'd rolled a die for their bed positions, and had the sleeping quarters sectioned off from the main room by an over-sized oriental screen that Wufei had helped Heero make, and a large bookshelf that Heero'd made on his own.

Trowa was fairly certain there was metal between one side of the wood and the other—even though it was a huge piece, it still seemed heavier than it should be.

His bed was against that and the wall. Quatre's bed was next, then Heero's. Wufei had his bed in the corner, and Duo's was along the far wall. There were myriad windows in the apartment, and they started about a foot from the ground and went up well into the vaulted ceiling.

Heero had actually built the closet himself...and again, Trowa was certain he'd used metal, since they'd sent him ahead of them and he'd had the place to himself for a week.

"The floor," Wufei informed Trowa almost pointedly. His amusement was true, though. He genuinely appreciated Trowa's instant assumption he was talking shit. Wufei would, given half a chance, talk about his weekend antics.

Trowa could only assume this was because Quatre would blush like the sweet virgin he was, Heero would call him a liar, and Duo actually wanted to hear.

Trowa snorted and rubbed his face, sitting up.

"So why you spillin' fantasies?" Wufei pressed, grinning fairly openly at his friend. "You about to indulge in a wet dream before it occurred to you we were all right here?"

Trowa flashed him a wicked grin, swinging out of bed and realizing why this question had been asked.

He had to pee.

"No, darling," he muttered, starting away. "I figured if I said I'd said it, you'd think it...and you know you want me."

Wufei guffawed. "I'd have Duo before you, Barton."

Duo laughed wickedly.

"Duo'd have anyone who'd have _him_," Trowa retorted.

Duo gave him a raised eyebrow glare.

Trowa flashed his friend an apologetic grin and moved through the curtain that separated the room from the main of the house.

House? It was a studio apartment with a loft.

He glanced up at their in-home gym.

Considering that they'd been successful teenage terrorists, people in the government had considered it their all-important duty to keep them happy and fed. The idea of them joining the military had been thrown around like rapid-fire, but they were done with the wars. The wars weighed heavily on their souls. They'd all decided the same thing with a look and had absolutely terrorized anyone who had the balls to give them an order.

At one point they'd nearly been court marshaled, but something about the teenage ex-terrorist tag had made the heads of state reconsider. Sally Po had sweetly stepped into that void and had taken 'her boys' aside for a pleasant supper and 'civil conversation'.

They'd been out of the military a week later.

The officials had allotted them each an amount of money to find their own housing, and Quatre had noted that it would probably be nicer if they all had the same apartment building. That had spiraled down to the fact that there were not five apartments open in any building across the United States.

Trowa finished his bathroom business in short order. The bathroom was between the entrance to the building and the kitchen, so he made a brief detour to grab himself a coffee cup.

He really had no clue what he'd woken up to, and he knew they weren't going to let him live down assuming it was another of Wufei's sex-eds...but he could live with that. It'd had been a while since he'd made an ass of himself, so he almost felt like it was his turn.

He pushed back through the curtain and received wicked grins in greeting, though Wufei obligingly lifted the coffee pot.

"...but whatever we end up doing we're going to want curtains," he explained. "So if we get carpeting first, we can match curtains later. Regina said she'd help with that."

"Regina?" Trowa echoed the name blankly, thinking over Wufei's myriad girlfriends.

"Light brown hair," Wufei supplied, measuring a length beside his neck. "Kinda short...comes over _all_ the fucking time?"

"Oh! Reg!" Trowa laughed in mild embarrassment.

Reg, or Regie as they usually called her, was one of Duo's coworkers.

Duo gave him a mildly amused look.

"Sorry, just woke up," Trowa muttered, dropping down and grabbing up some sugar packets.

"Do we want an area rug or the floor done?" Wufei added, studying Trowa's face.

Trowa blinked at him.

Wufei gestured, again obligingly, at the floor they were sitting on and back toward Duo's bed.

"Uh..."

"Yeah, that's the response," Wufei noted, rolling his eyes and looking back to the others.

"I don't give a shit," Heero explained to Trowa. "A throw or a floor of it would warm it up in here," he shrugged. He wanted _something_ done and could live with that. "Either way works."

"We'd have to vacuum," Duo noted, frowning slightly.

"We should sweep anyway," Quatre retorted.

"We have a broom, we don't have a vacuum," Duo returned.

Trowa took a drink from his cup and was glad no one was watching him, reaching forward quickly to grab a creamer.

"We can get a vacuum in like...twenty minutes," Heero noted pointedly. "We wouldn't make you vacuum anymore than we make you sweep."

Duo flashed him a grin and shrugged.

Duo wasn't the type for menial chores. He was working as the second to an architect, supposedly some sort of pupil. They could get him to clean the kitchen and bathroom, but the rest of it was beyond his scope.

Actually, the chores were fairly straightforward. Someone cleaned the gym in total, someone swept the downstairs, someone cleaned the bathroom, and someone cleaned the kitchen...that left the last person to take care of the garbage and recycling. If you tossed the trash and recycling at Duo as he left the apartment, he had absolutely no issues taking them out...but he couldn't seem to sweep or ever clean the gym.

Granted, cleaning the gym included maintenance on the workout equipment...

The chores weren't really that well balanced.

As for the kitchen and bathroom cleaning, the former L-2 pilot had deep-seeded disgust if either place seemed remotely dirty. He'd admitted the issues one night when they'd all been somber and had been drinking. The kitchens and bathrooms at his orphanage had been clean, but after that had all been blown to shit and he'd jumped the sweeper carrier...they hadn't kept their bathroom clean and almost everyone had gotten sick, and similarly, their kitchen had been sub-standard and he himself had gotten sick pretty bad. He was fairly OCD about it, and since none of them particularly felt joy in cleaning the bathroom, they left him to it, though occasionally—to be fair—they shoved garbage duty on him.

"You might like vacuuming," Trowa noted, meeting the guy's eyes. "You never know until you try."

"What does my liking and disliking have to do with anything?" Duo retorted, though it wasn't an angered or annoyed response.

Trowa grinned and took another sip of his coffee.

It tasted pretty damn good, actually.

"I think we should just get the floor done," Wufei added, studying Trowa. "What do you think?"

"I think Duo's avoiding the idea of carpeting, Heero doesn't give a damn...you're for it, and Quatre probably likes the throw-rug notion."

Quatre grinned at that.

"We still have to get a vacuum for a throw," Heero noted to Duo.

"So that means it's one vote all and one vote small," Wufei said calmly. "Heero will go with majority, and Duo's screwed himself."

Duo snorted.

Trowa grinned, considering them all a long moment and looking back to Wufei. If he wasn't aware of the fact that Heero honestly wanted something done about it, he'd have gone with Duo's argument. Considering that he couldn't rightly do that, all things considered, he decided the next best route—it was possibly even more amusing. "I don't give a damn."

Heero started laughing his wicked little chuckle. It wasn't loud or intruding, it was like the madman whose evil plots were working out to his benefit.

Wufei glared at Trowa.

Trowa snickered and looked away.

"I hate you," Wufei informed him—but considering how often those words came out of his mouth, none of them felt particularly stung by the sentence.

Trowa grinned more and went back to his coffee.

- -

"You're kidding, right?" Quatre muttered, staring at the pile of paper on his desk. "You didn't just put that all in my inbox."

"We were waiting for Anali to get back," Terry muttered almost tightly, looking to the ceiling. "She had to sign off on all of that before we could get them to you..."

"And you expect me to get this done before my time off?" Quatre snapped irritably.

"You're efficient," the man noted, meeting his eyes. "You'll get most of it done...and the rest...the...I..." he sighed, looking away again.

Quatre rolled his eyes.

He'd get it all done for them, if he didn't, it would fuck up the entire workplace almost as much as Anali's strategic vacation.

Stupid woman.

Quatre sighed and dropped into his seat, logging onto his computer. Terry knew it as the dismissal it was and darted out the door.

If Quatre had just taken the job his sister had wanted him to in Winner Industries, he wouldn't have to bother with the menial paper-pushing. If he'd taken it, he'd just be making _all_ the damn decisions for the _entire_ company.

He had to remind himself of that every now and again, or he'd start longing for the salaried position of CEO.

Well...it wasn't really CEO, but considering who he was, the actual CEO would happily play figurehead for the masses.

...and it wasn't the part of him that was a Gundam pilot, either.

Getting this job had seemed like a dream come true when they'd actually hired him. The owner of the company was a man Quatre's father had done a favor for before his death, so taking on the man's son hadn't been an imposition. Actually, the man had lectured him for most of the first visit that he was trained for much _greater_ things. The military role he'd had hadn't been just a lackey with a gun. He and his roommates had been in charge of a large portion of men. They'd been eighteen, though, and hadn't felt any particular need to be ordered around.

They'd had enough of that during the wars.

Veterans at twenty-two...honored veterans...who'd fought the _entire_ war.

Quatre shook his head.

He did really prefer this quiet life-style. His job in the company was necessary, but not life-altering. If he missed a few days of work, the pile in his inbox might get a bit tall, but the entire company was efficient enough that nothing was ever down to the wire.

Going home after eight or twelve hours of that to his roommates was far from troublesome. He agreed that it might have been nice to use the extra money on partitions so they could have a semblance of private bedrooms...but he couldn't say he regretted all the windows being bulletproof glass instead.

Actually, they didn't let that be common knowledge and persisted that they'd spent the money for the partitions on their gym. It sounded reasonable enough, though truth-be-told, Quatre had taken the equipment from one of his myriad family mansions.

Might be nicer to move into one of them, actually. His sister was starting to talk about selling them off...

He shook his head, his fingers flying over the keyboard as he replied to the an email his boss had sent, confirmation on his request for time off and his final approval on the strategy they'd use to fill his void.

He didn't really care, but the boss liked his approval.

He'd been taking shorter and shorter days, leading up to his vacation time. He wanted everyone to be sure they understood what it would be like with him gone—that was how he could sit around the room all morning arguing with Wufei about a carpet or a throw-rug.

Maybe they could go hit one of the family manors on time off...find a new place to live in warmer climes where they wouldn't have to keep their stereo level down to appease the neighbors.

He grinned slightly as he considered their apartment.

Heero had built the bookshelf, and from what Quatre had gathered from the material invoice, he'd used Gundanium in it...a lot, actually. Which probably meant the closet was lined with the stuff, too. That'd save their asses from mortar rounds or any such fancy. Heero's paranoia of being attacked had settled back, but it would never truly be gone. It made him who he was—not the paranoia, but the training that caused it.

It was sort of like the fact that both he and Wufei still practiced their martial arts...actually, the top of the closet was a few feet above head level...and covered in matting. It was used for meditation—actually, Wufei had taught Duo how to do it at one point, so even Duo would hop up on top of the thing to find his center.

Whatever that meant.

Quatre grinned more, falling into the rhythm of his job.

They had the tatami matting on the gym floor. There was a large half-round window in the loft that faced east, and during the spring and summer days, Quatre knew he wasn't the only one who watched the twin shadows of the Asian men going through a routine older than time itself. The...what had they called them? Katas? Forms? It was all some sort of martial art, and the graceful shadows on the west wall of the apartment were almost as good as a screen.

He could think of worse ways to start his day, not that Trowa waking up and commenting the way he had was a bad way to wake up either.

They had a comfortable camaraderie, picking at each other like brothers would and relying on each other as friends. They all had ways to get their own space, and they all knew when it needed respected. Most people thought they should have torn each other to shreds after a month, but it had been a bit more than a year now.

So why was Wufei suddenly so worried about carpeting?

A small inner voice at the back of Quatre's mind perked up at the rhetoric question and noted very pointedly that it was because Heero'd been complaining about it. The voice was very aware that Heero's complaining wouldn't come off as complaining to anyone else. Random statistical notes about the approximate temperature of the floor, cautions to the other pilots to buy slippers to avoid said temperatures...what else? A note that the air seemed chill and the large windows might need reinforcement before the next winter came around.

That actually explained the curtains that Wufei was suddenly very interested in, too.

It wasn't really like Quatre didn't understand. Heero had come out of a shell of iron over the years—initially only with Duo or Wufei. That had blossomed into him opening up with curiosity and confusion for all four of them. The way Heero'd been "raised" had meant that his discomfort was to be ignored. It had taken them all a lot of persuasion to get him to even note that he _felt_ discomfort.

It would be stupid to ruin all their progress by ignoring this...and unfair, considering that the rest of them would have just ordered a carpet in some form or another. Heero did few things like that for himself. He'd gotten to the point of buying his own clothes and hitting on women...but the clothes were always brought home for immediate approval...and the women weren't any of their business.

Even though Wufei felt the need to share.

Quatre grinned a little more, moving on to the next file.

He'd concede to Wufei when he got home and let the man pick the carpet. He'd state the need for a darker color, but let Wufei and Heero figure out the rest. Hell, they'd been the ones to decorate the rest of the bedroom anyway.

The little voice that had piped up before snickered at Quatre—or Quatre snickered at his own hypocrisy in that statement.

He didn't really have any ground to stand on there...he'd done the living room.

- -

Duo flashed Reg a wicked grin as she stopped to stare at the runner he'd sent to give her her orders. She was a carpentry specialist that could give Heero a run for his money, and the fact that their employer was a colony-born dolt who wanted real wood—he thought it a special order, and was going to swoon when he realized that there was more than one choice for _real_ wood on Earth. It was expensive enough, but not too bad for someone with money to burn.

Reg turned to stare directly back at him, and Wufei's words were burning in her eyes. 'I hate you.'

He laughed happily at it and went back to the checklist he'd been working on all morning.

Really, he was the one that had to present the choices to the man. It was one of many reasons they were all taking a vacation. He had to hop out to L-1, and while he was at it, they were going to join him and do a tour. Quatre had siblings, of course...and he had some old friends. Wufei hadn't been too thrilled for the trip, mainly because his family was gone...his colony was gone. This was going to be hard for him. He hadn't been back to L-5 after the wars had ended.

He didn't really even look at the stars.

Heero didn't seem to care, but he was one of the first to arrange the time off when the idea had been suggested. In the Yuy book, that meant eagerness. Who knew why the man wanted to get back out to space? ...Though Duo had the sneaking suspicion that this was because they'd get to pilot suits again at L-4. The suits were disarmed now, used for outer maintenance on the colonies and such nonsense...but they still moved.

The Gundams were gone as far as the public knew or cared...they used the footage of Shenlong exploding to help that myth along.

Wufei was the only one who could actually part with his Gundam when it came down to it. He'd done it entirely on his own and had noted that he'd thought the others _might_, but had been more inclined toward the truth of the matter—Heero was too much of a strategist to destroy his trump card. The bastard was a damn good liar, which helped Duo in a lot of ways.

He didn't like that he'd lied...or that he'd done it successfully...but he didn't have to keep up the guise, Heero did it for him.

He shook his head, focusing back on his work.

He wasn't actually looking forward to going back to the colonies. He'd been far more inclined to get his job done and come back to finish the ground-work. It had been the others who'd pounced on the idea of the tour, and Heero's obvious desire to get back to it had jump started the rest into action.

He knew he'd enjoy himself, if only because the way Wufei and Trowa bickered or the way Heero talked absolute shit to either of those males—hell, Quatre getting all flustered and embarrassed about Wufei's stories was amusing, too.

But really...if he'd had his way, he'd have taken Wufei's route and stopped thinking about the past.

...but for some reason, he couldn't stop looking at the stars.

- -

Heero ran his fingers through a shag carpet, considering the feeling of it. It almost seemed sticky to him, so he didn't like it, but he wanted to give it fair consideration.

He was happy that his friends were okay with the notion of a carpet. The wood floors of the apartment had been nice enough at first, but as the weather had turned toward winter again he'd realized the one downside to them.

They didn't stay _warm_.

Growing up, his only consideration for warmth or cold had been whether or not it would damage anything permanently. There'd been a drive to conserve fuel somewhere in the mess of thoughts, so he hadn't actually pursued it until Duo had randomly shown up in his cockpit and whined about the heat.

More to get him to shut up the noise than anything, he'd turned the heat up. It'd felt good and almost naughty, and Duo had fallen asleep not long after. He hadn't turned it down until the heat of summer had caused him to sweat so much there was a slight smell. It had taken him a while to clean that out, and using the air conditioning had ran through his logic as a need to keep his body hydrated.

It amused him to think back to the first comfort he chose for himself...the vast lie he'd let his mind cling to. It had been his guilty pleasure, and had led him to do more little comfort things later—adding blankets to his bed or adjusting the heat of the rooms they were in...he'd set things to 'comfort zone' when Duo was coming over...and...those were distracting thoughts.

Heero grinned to himself as he moved onto the next sort of carpet. He'd really _enjoyed_ the time he'd spent with Duo. He could admit to himself again that the physical desire hadn't been as big a hassle to deal with as he'd pretended. He'd been grateful that Duo'd obliged him...Duo probably knew very well that he'd been lying...probably didn't give a damn either, because it wasn't like _he_ hadn't enjoyed their time together.

Actually, once in a while Heero would note the look in Duo's eyes from before...one that he'd come to realize was lust. It hadn't been so clear in the beginning; it had totally taken him out of everything he knew. Duo's over-nights would turn into three-day affairs if Heero didn't have anything else going on.

It was sort of too bad Duo'd ended that relationship...but Heero knew that Duo wanted a _relationship_, not a fuck-buddy. That was the difference between their takes on it—Wufei had explained it to him before...

Heero frowned at the too-short feeling of that rug and looked up the line. There'd been a carpet at a hotel once that had felt really good on his feet. It had been soft and not long...he moved on, trying to find one like that.

...maybe Duo'd oblige him again.

Heero smirked at the idea. There'd been a point where that was an honest consideration, but anymore he knew what he meant. Maybe Duo'd want to fuck again, he'd have to pursue it next time he saw the lust in Duo's eyes. He knew for a fact that Wufei would understand that. Quatre would be embarrassed at the blatant desire...Duo might or might not be game...and Trowa would probably be the funniest one to watch react.

Living with his friends had given him multiple personalities to observe...ones he didn't mind imitating. He'd been watching others back on the base before the guys had stopped wanting to live there, and he had a feeling that was where his amusement for the relationship he and Duo'd had came from. As far as he'd gathered, he should be looking at the living arrangements as living with an ex, but Duo was still his friend, and a damn good one. They hadn't broken up like he'd heard the other guys talking about either. 'Breaking up' usually entailed yelling and name calling, occasionally begging and, very frequently, bitterness. He felt none of this for Duo...and theirs had ended with Duo one day sighing and telling him point-blank that it didn't work.

He'd been annoyed later when he saw Duo with a pretty woman. He'd been even more annoyed later to find out that Duo was sexually frustrated because she hadn't allowed him to bed her...but there was something else in Duo, in his personality. At that point he'd been happy.

_That_ relationship had ended with yelling and Duo being hurt...he'd been the one to call it off, but she'd said some things that had wounded him.

So...that could rest where its complications went beyond Heero's consideration.

He stopped in front of a thicker looking carpet and touched it gently.

"Can I help you?" a semi-Asian salesman asked with interest, stopping near Heero. "I'm sorry I didn't get here before, but we're busy," he indicated the customers moving around the store.

"It's fine," Heero returned, noting that the guy was pretty—sort of pretty like Duo. He knew enough about himself to know this interest was piqued more from his lack of sex in the past few weeks...but the guy had a very interesting mouth.

"So...are you," the guy shifted, his slightly almond shaped eyes lowering almost shyly. "Are you looking for anything specific?"

Shy? That implied interest.

Heero filed that away for the time being. The guy wouldn't be able to give him his personal information while working—unless he wasn't closely watched by his supervisors. Heero looked around without moving his head a moment, then indicated the carpet. "I was in a hotel once. It had a carpet like this..."

"Max!"

Heero looked around to Wufei, then glanced at his watch. Wufei'd barely gotten out of work, what was he...

"Max!" Wufei repeated, bouncing in closer to smile at the man helping him and look around. "We got the go. Q said he wants it brown but aside from that we can do it."

The salesman blinked at Wufei, starting to withdraw.

Damn it.

Heero stretched his neck pointedly before nodding, then indicated the one he was looking at.

"How much is padding?" Wufei asked the salesman. As far as he was concerned, that stretching of the neck was Heero snapping at him not to be annoying. He wasn't sure why his approach annoyed his friend, though...maybe he'd been having a bad day? He'd have to ask...oh.

Pretty boy.

Wufei blinked at the salesman a moment, then grinned. "The really thick padding," he added, stepping back slightly.

It was always funny to remember that Heero was genuinely bisexual. When they went out or did anything in a group, his attention was firmly fixed on the females Wufei and Trowa generally noticed. On his own, Heero could find any random female...and just as often any random male. He felt no shame in his indiscriminate tastes, and really, did he need to? His comments about Trowa not walking were very very genuine, and that fact was probably the only reason why Trowa hadn't had a snappy comeback.

Wufei ran his tongue along his teeth, trying not to grin at his friend's prey. He hadn't meant to cock-block, but looking for a carpet hardly seemed like the place to pick-up a bedmate.

"What are you grinning at?" Heero asked Wufei in Japanese.

The salesman stuttered to a stop. He'd dealt with Wufei's approach and was working as the salesman again, but at the question, his eyes flicked up to Heero nervously.

"We're thinking one of the thickest might be best," Wufei noted to the man, trying to figure out how to make it plain that he wasn't a life partner. "He's uh...got a throw by his bed, but the place has got hard-wood floors. I don't particularly need the soft by my bed, but it'd be stupid to cut the carpet up."

He felt more than saw a bright smile cross Heero's face.

Okay, he'd made up for the annoyance he'd offered with that one.

"Max?" the guy asked, looking to Heero, shy. He tucked a lock of his shaggy black hair behind his ear and licked his lips in a way that Wufei had observed distracted Heero from anyone—just what the hell had Duo done? Wufei was almost curious to know if the American man would be wiling to demonstrate...but had a feeling it would be left on the level of a bad joke.

"Yeah," Heero returned, eyes sparkling. "I got a couple roommates and we're all sick of the cold floor..."

The guy tucked the stray lock behind his ear again, almost smiling at that.

He was kinda cute in an androgynous way...if Wufei wasn't aware that it _was_ a guy he might have had his head turned.

"We have some examples of the padding...over here," he pointed toward a back corner.

"I'm gonna look at more carpets," Wufei noted to Heero with a grin, considering his friend as he ran his tongue along the back of his teeth.

...until that caught Heero's attention.

He grinned more and pointedly closed his mouth.

Heero snickered and smacked at him, then turned and followed the salesman away.

Wufei grinned more, running a hand through his hair as he looked at the carpet Heero'd picked. As long as it wasn't shag, he didn't particularly give a damn...but Quatre had insisted on a brown color that wouldn't clash with the other colors of the room...and while Wufei longed to tease him about being secretly gay, he had agreed to let Regina help him with curtains. That had entailed him promising to color coordinate, and the fact that _he_ was going to pick the curtains ended the gay-jokes before they could even properly start.

It was too bad really...maybe Trowa would get the jokes in anyway. He was aloof enough from the goings on that he could say them without being a hypocrite.

...and really, they _really_ needed to be said.

- -

"What was your name?" Heero muttered, glancing at the guy from the pillow he was pushing on. Well, it wasn't really a pillow, but it was soft enough.

He could see why Wufei'd said that he didn't need the full soft.

"My name is Matty," he explained, gesturing at his nametag. The thing actually said Matt, but Heero wasn't going to protest being given the familiar version. "What's Max short for?"

Heero shrugged. "Maximillion."

Considering the leader that the original Heero Yuy had been, he and his friends had decided that he needed a new public name. Maximillion wasn't that Asian, but they'd made up for that fact with his last name. Maximillion Tsuyo.

"You work here long?" Heero added, setting the thick bit of padding back down and picking up a thinner one.

"A year or two," the guy agreed, shifting slightly in that same nervous dance. From what Heero could tell, the guy was interested in him, and probably thinking about how much trouble he'd get in if he were caught flirting. Either that or Heero's own interest in him made him antsy...hard to tell. He'd never been able to really read if guys were straight or not...he could get them into bed either way, Duo and Wufei had helped him hone those skills...but it was usually easier to deal with'em if they liked guys to start with.

Was that a bastard thing to think? He could hear Duo cackling and telling him he _was_ a bastard.

"Mm," Heero muttered, setting that down and picking up the next. To the guy it probably looked like he was going through the motions.

Return interest now, idiot.

That sounded like Wufei...his friends had really colored his thought processing.

The guy bit his lip and shifted again.

Ah. Interest.

Heero grinned slightly and met his eyes.

The guy smiled, almost blushing, and gestured vaguely at the padding.

"It's the one," Heero agreed, passing it over. "I should get your number, in case I change my mind."

That got the most genuine smile he'd ever seen from the guy, sparkling eyes and a hint of reproof.

"No?" Heero asked, grinning more. "Come on, I thought it was clever..."

The guy laughed, looking toward the main of the store quickly. "I'm not giving you my number..."

"No?" Heero considered him with interest a moment. "I asked too soon...damn..."

The guy's cheeks flared.

Heero sighed a bit forlornly. "I thought so," he gave up on the endeavor and passed the padding he picked over. "We need to get my friend to sign off on this...we can set up the details of installation and shit, too."

The guy looked almost disappointed, but nodded his assent as he considered the swatch he was holding. "It's on sale," he offered, looking up to Heero again. "This one is on sale..."

"Even better, I'm thinking the carpet I picked is expensive," he flashed the guy a grin. "Come on..."

Wufei looked to him in confusion when he saw the way the other was following, and he could see that Wufei understood that Heero's move had failed. It kind of reassured him to see the startled confusion in the look the guy gave him—nice to know Wufei had faith in him, even in a silly instance.

"What happened?" Wufei muttered in Japanese, taking the bit that Matt was holding out to him.

"Thought I had him and moved in," Heero shrugged. "Too fast, he's a submissive one, not confident yet."

"Uh..." the guy hesitated, looking between them.

"Is he even of age?" Wufei retorted, then nodded at the padding and pulled down the color chart for the carpet. "We'll want this one," he indicated a dark chocolate brown.

"All right," Matt muttered, obviously memorizing the color name before turning and starting to a little desk. "Have you measured the space yet?"

- -

Wufei was amused at how utterly efficient Matt was...even after whatever had played out in the back area. By the looks the guy was giving Heero, making them as unobtrusive as he could possibly manage, the move may have been too fast, but the interest hadn't abated.

...what had Heero said?

Wufei fought the grin that kept pricking the sides of his mouth. The kid wasn't stupid, he'd recognize the amusement if Wufei didn't keep himself in hand...but the way he'd annoyed Heero on his approach had totally intrigued him for the whole ordeal. He'd never seen Heero work on a guy, and according to some of the shit he'd said—and even the reaction of the guys he'd been with when Wufei was picking him up from a hotel room—he was very capable of netting the most unlikely of bedmates.

Maybe that was it...Heero wouldn't mess with legal limits, and if the guy was under eighteen he wasn't going to pursue...

"There," Matt muttered, writing the information down on a card and passing it to Heero. "We'll get ahold of you tomorrow to set up the key exchange and sign the insurance policies," they'd told him they'd be out of town for the installation.

"Thanks," Heero muttered, taking the thing and pulling out his wallet.

Wufei noted the little boy noticing the condoms that were in the thing.

...that was funny, the look on his face...

He mastered it, though, after the briefest of moments. Heero wouldn't have seen it...and then his eyes flicked to Wufei, noting the scrutiny.

Wufei grinned and looked down the way to the side—a woman was standing there with a very low cut shirt.

Matt snorted very slightly...and seemed to decide something.

"You were very helpful," Heero was muttering pleasantly as he gathered himself up to leave...he probably hadn't realized that the piece of paper Matt had torn up wasn't part of the job requirement...and his hand had a slight twitch in it that was almost a shake as he started writing.

Wufei stood slowly, wondering when Heero would realize what the twit was doing.

"I truly hope your day is good," Matt noted to them...in Japanese.

Wufei started snickering.

He held the bit of paper up to Heero, meeting his eyes as he waited.

Heero took it, blinking back in confusion a moment before glancing at the sheet. Matt would never realize he'd memorized the number in that glance...he grinned slightly, looking down to the guy.

"Maybe...you have roommates?"

Heero's grin turned abruptly wicked.

Matt almost blushed and looked down a moment before meeting Wufei's eyes. "I get off at seven..." his voice had barely faltered.

"And eight," Heero mused, starting to walk away as the boy blushed again. "Maybe nine if I'm lucky," he added for Wufei's further amusement.

Wufei laughed happily, appreciating the brazen balls that giving his number like that really had to have taken the kid...and bounced out of the store.

He really was having a very good day.


	2. Chapter 2

**Two**

"I was careful," Wufei retorted into the phone as he moved around the kitchen, making supper. "You'll have to talk to Heero about _his_ choice, though...they'll probably swing by..." he started laughing wickedly.

Duo moved tiredly into the apartment, looking up to Wufei with interest.

"Oh...false alarm, its Duo," he noted, turning back to the stove. "What? No...no, you'll seriously have to talk to him, hold on...Duo?"

Duo nodded curiously.

"Don't run off, I want to run something by you that's been bugging me a few hours now..."

"All right," Duo returned, not horribly curious as to what that was about. He untied his boots and slid them off, sighing slightly before grabbing the deodorizer and zapping the insides. He didn't particularly think his feet stank, but that could just be because he sprayed them down every day.

"No...no...I'd be more worried about...what? What?" Wufei was obviously taken off track by whatever question the person on the other end of the line had. "It's brown...uh..."

Duo could hear Quatre's voice rise to some offense.

"Chocolate!" Wufei protested back. "Chocolate brown! It'll look good with the wood of the closet and stuff...I'm not _stupid_, Winner."

Duo snickered at that...and was greeted with Wufei's middle finger.

He snickered more and moved around into the bathroom. He was covered with grit and grime. His braid would also be caked with it...that was a normal day for him. Victor had two sites he was working, and there was another apprentice at the other site that actually needed his help and supervision. Victor would spend his morning at the other site, break for lunch, then come over to see what Duo was up to and pretend to check for errors. He generally sat around talking with Duo about the finer details of either job for an hour while Duo directed the workers, then would get a call from the other apprentice and have to regretfully leave. He'd show up to sign off on the day's work and speed Duo along with some form of praise or appreciation to let him know he _was_ appreciated...and Duo would go home to his psycho roommates to see what bullshit they'd gotten into with the two or three hour gap they had before he got off work.

He undid his braid over the tub, not wanting to sweep the floor again, then sighed as the wood and whatever else fluttered to the floor.

It was no good...he was going to have to cut it.

He ran his fingers through his hair again, regretfully, then shook his head to get the stuff out of the top part.

He really had wanted to keep his braid, but the longer he was at the job site the more he was realizing it would be a hazard. He didn't want to keep it down the back of his shirt, that got the crud in the air down his back...and he had no way to secure it up, because it was thick and long.

Maybe Reg had the right of it with her page-boy cut...

He'd run it by the others later.

He stepped into the hot water and took a moment to appreciate the luxury. There'd been far too many days during the war where he'd had to jump into a cold shower and clean himself while trying not to freeze...and he hadn't really showered regularly before that.

He grinned slightly and settled back to wet his hair.

He really didn't want to cut it, but it just wasn't working now. He'd been able to have it throughout the damn wars and now, working on building a _house_, he had to cut it. That seemed unfair in the larger scheme of things, but he'd gone through the counseling to allow the braid to just be hair again. He'd always promised himself that he wouldn't make excuses when it came time to cut it...didn't mean he had to like it.

The house was quiet when he moved from the bathroom, a towel around his waist and another wrapping the end of his hair.

"Oi," Wufei muttered, turning to flash him a grin. "Taste this..."

There was an expression in his eyes that made Duo doubt his intentions, but he leaned forward and sniffed the spoon he was being offered.

"Oh, just do it," Wufei muttered, grinning slightly. He'd had Duo taste some nasty things before, or some insanely spicy things.

"You're a damn raven," Duo retorted, sniffing again. "I can't trust you..."

Wufei cocked his head to one side at that in a strangely agreeing motion...and undid the tuck of the towel around his waist.

Duo laughed wickedly, realizing he'd opened himself up to that one as he caught the thing, then glowered at the Chinese man.

"Taste it," Wufei ordered with a mischievous grin.

"I don't trust you," Duo retorted, pressing his towel over his waist. There really was no particular reason he was even showing the modesty there. They'd run around the house naked to get coffee. Not everyone was home, though, and that meant that people could walk in...which really meant Duo should probably get to the room.

"Do it," Wufei persisted, grinning even more as he studied Duo's face.

Duo gave in and took the offered spoonful, then stopped thoughtfully. "What is that?"

"Vodka sauce," Wufei explained, indicating a pan behind him. "I'm going to throw some sort of vegetable in it, I think...making noodles...you might want to get beyond the curtain, huh?"

"Huh?" Duo asked, blinking at that...as the door opened.

"I don't know whose all home," Heero was noting. "At least Ian and War..." he trailed off.

Duo turned to the door in alarm...to look at some guy he'd never seen...but the guy had Heero's bruise—a mimic of a hickey—near his collarbone which attested to the reason of his presence.

...and Duo's ass was completely bare.

Wufei started laughing as he watched the kid, whose eyes had traveled Duo's full back and obviously couldn't look away.

"Hey, now," Duo muttered, draping the towel around again. "I don't play with minors."

"I'm nineteen!" the kid protested.

Heero's smirk was wicked.

"Prove it," Duo retorted, wrapping the towel properly and stepping forward.

The kid looked a little huffy, but not all that surprised as he pulled out his wallet and passed over an I.D. card, pointing at the date.

"Cute picture," Duo noted, studying the thing with interest. "You've been nineteen a whole of two weeks," he added, looking up to Heero.

Wufei was laughing his ass off at the counter.

"I looked," Heero retorted. "Don't be annoying...go get some clothes on."

"But he's not a minor," Duo noted, grinning wickedly. "I can play with him."

The kid flushed at that.

"He's played out!" Wufei declared, his amusement still high.

"What are you cackling about?" Trowa demanded, moving in behind the pair and raising an eyebrow at Duo before looking back to the kid.

"Uh, Matty?" Heero muttered, probably remembering his manners. "This is T...Rigel. Rige, this is Matt."

"Hey," Trowa muttered, looking him over skeptically.

"The cackling raven back there is Ian," he added, indicating Wufei. "And my dear naked friend here is Warrick. If you're up to it, feel free to follow him wherever he'll lead you...but considering that nap I woke you up from, you may wanna back out."

Duo gave Heero a heavy-lidded amused look before quirking his eyebrows at the kid.

"Knock it off," Trowa muttered, breaking between them and shoving Duo toward the room. "Get dressed, idiot."

Heero and Duo gave him a skeptical look, but the moment of opportunity passed, and Duo shrugged, turning to head toward the bedroom part.

"What are you cackling at?" Trowa repeated to Wufei.

"I dropped War's towel," Wufei explained why Heero and Matt had been greeted with the other's ass on entering. "I thought he'd take my word for it and get into the bedroom, but he didn't...so little one there got an eyeful."

"I really don't like being treated like a child," Matt muttered, looking down in embarrassment.

"Then don't act like one," Wufei retorted. "Tell me I'm an ass and hold your own." He pointed at the bruise. "You got Max's tramp-stamp of approval, means you'll come around again...I'm told I'm obnoxious."

"You _are_," Heero agreed darkly. He'd had a friend before that highly approved of the bruise being called a tramp-stamp, and for some reason Wufei never bothered to explain, he persisted in referring to the bruise as such every time he saw it. More than one of Heero's goes had been cut quite short by the term alone.

"He's got the vodka out," Trowa noted, picking up the bottle to show Heero. "Want me to brain him?"

"I made sauce," Wufei retorted, snatching the bottle back and sniff it at it as it caught his attention. He'd dealt with his alcohol problem...and even besides that, it was going on eight. It wasn't too early to have a sipper.

Duo moved from the room in a pair of jeans that never failed to turn Heero's head. Actually, it was usually their cue that the American was going to get laid, because even though he ignored the open interest Heero still had in his body, he knew he was dressed good when he got a response.

Matt shifted back against Heero, though his eyes were moving over Duo's sculpted chest and well-muscled abdomen.

"Stay for supper?" Wufei offered, grinning as he looked Duo over in amusement. He had absolutely no interest in pursuing any male, but he and Heero had talked enough that he was able to pick out what things on the male form could draw another man's eye. He was more toward the jealous side of the look-over, though his and Duo's bodies weren't that different, and he could totally kick the other's ass...Trowa, on the other hand, seemed almost nervous.

Wufei indicated that with his eyes to Heero before flicking the water on.

"If it's not an imposition," Matt returned to Wufei's offer, looking down.

"How was your day?" Heero asked Duo with interest as Duo pulled his shirt down over his head.

"Not bad...pretty normal...you got your shit packed?"

The smile that flitted across Heero's face was naughty before he shrugged. "Not yet, no...working on it."

Wufei coughed over the shot he'd poured himself, focusing entirely on the clear liquid that had spilled over his hand.

...

"We're leaving in a day," Duo noted almost skeptically as he looked to Wufei. "You might want to get on it."

"Leaving?" Matt asked, turning into Heero's arms.

"We're going to the colonies," Heero explained easily, willingly. His own personal form of eagerness...evidently he liked the kid.

"What's that about?" Duo muttered in Swedish.

"Your phrasing," Wufei retorted, then switched back to English. "You just got off work, didn't you?"

The kid almost blushed as he looked back to Wufei. "We were texting...he picked me up when I got off."

"Eager, much?" Wufei asked sweetly in Swedish.

"I don't understand you," Heero returned, his expression creasing a moment.

"What language was that?" Matt added, looking between them curiously.

"Swedish," Duo returned happily.

"Can you speak Japanese?" the kid muttered to him.

"Who can't?" Trowa returned in amusement. "Or don't you know?"

"I know it," Matt returned, grinning slightly at Wufei.

Wufei grinned back. He didn't mind being made an ass of. It was usually funnier that way. If he'd done something to get called out on he preferred it to be dropped on him. He spent half his days trying to make the people around him laugh.

"We were...uh...discussing," Heero noted, indicating Wufei with his head.

"Discussing?" Trowa asked darkly.

"What were you saying about submissive?" Max asked in a form of dark amusement that wasn't nearly so naïve as he'd been coming off.

"I call'em as I see'em," Heero retorted happily. "I'm not right _all_ the time."

"Eh?" Wufei asked, intrigued again.

"We got to the hotel room," Heero started to explain.

"Max!" Matt protested, throwing himself against Heero again in a way that caught his friend's attention. It was obvious he didn't want his antics covered, even though that bruise suggested how successful they'd been in entertaining Heero.

Not that he'd know that.

Wufei took pity on the kid and moved back to the fridge to pull out the vegetables. He'd set the water to boil already...and forgot his shot.

Actually, that was probably a good thing.

Trowa shifted mildly uncomfortably, and Wufei turned his head to see why.

Matt had his mouth up to Heero's ear, licking or biting it, considering how very still Heero had become...

Wufei cleared his throat.

"Uh...yeah," Heero broke away from his friend in amusement. "Yeah...what are you, uh," he cleared his throat. "What'ya makin', Fei?"

"Fei?" Matt repeated.

"Ian's an assumed name," Wufei explained promptly. "You'll have to come around more than once before you get the real ones."

"That's mysterious," Matt returned, interested instead of offended. It was kinda like he hadn't more than touched his bruise when Wufei'd called it the stamp.

"You might make it around here, kid," Duo mused, sitting at the bar, which Matt had leaned against. "Try and stick around a little."

"You're leaving," Matt retorted, looking back to him. "How can I stick around if you're leaving?"

"You said _you_ were leaving, too," Heero retorted, sitting on the third of the four stools.

"You hadn't told me you were," he retorted.

"We did, too," Wufei countered. "Remember? We have to go sign the insurance shit tomorrow?"

The kid blinked, and it was obvious to Wufei that he normally kept his work and private lives separate. He may have spaced off where Heero had actually _come_ from.

"We're heading to L-1 in a day," Heero noted, willing to talk as far as the kid was concerned—but eager to keep as far as his friends were. "We're going to colony hop."

"You've been before? Or is it a vacation?"

"We were all born and raised in the different colonies," Wufei explained. "We all...uh...moved...down here six or seven years ago."

Trowa snorted, but disappeared into the back room.

Matt nodded.

"You notice that?" Duo asked Wufei in a quiet tone, not moving his mouth as he indicated Trowa.

Wufei nodded.

"What?" Matt muttered.

Heero shook his head, grabbing the kid's hand. "Shh."

"You think he meant it this morning?" Wufei returned without quite moving his mouth either. They'd all made studies of their friends, and had figured out how loud or quiet they could be for each.

"Not consciously," Duo purred, then smirked at Matt. "Like my ass?"

Matt blinked at him, obviously at a loss.

"You got a full view of it," Heero noted in amusement. "We all saw you looking."

Matt blushed hard, turning to bury his face in Heero's chest.

Heero sniggered slightly and looked to Wufei, then nodded his head once.

Wufei tilted his head in question. They'd all gotten that he approved of his new little toy...just not why. Or at least...why Heero would be so eagerly keeping him about the house, or have taken him there to begin with.

Heero stretched his neck, which signified that he'd been sated, then grinned at Wufei.

The grin meant something, but Wufei didn't know what. ...though, actually, with what Heero'd said...he'd said Matt was submissive and not confident in the store...and had noted the lie there. He'd been about to explain himself when Matt had freaked out. Matt wasn't really all that self-confident.

A slow smirk started across his face as he raised his eyes again.

Heero's wicked grin confirmed his assumption.

"Shit!" he muttered, starting to laugh...and turned at the same time back to the food he was supposed to be making.

"What?" Matt asked blankly.

"I didn't add the salt to the water," Wufei explained, nonplussed by the lie. Actually, it was the truth, too. He pulled down the salt and measured a good amount into his palm...and spilled it into the water.

"You gonna tell me?" Duo asked in Swedish.

"At the store, he noted that he was submissive and had no confidence," Wufei agreed in kind.

Duo considered that a moment, then looked briefly back to the male cuddling into Heero's chest. A slow smirk crossed his face as well, and he met Heero's eyes.

Heero grinned back, either proud or just...proud.

"None of that, little one," Duo chided when Matt's mouth moved treacherously close to Heero's ear. As he said it, he looped an arm around the guy's waist and pulled him easily away from the counter.

It left Matt staring at him with huge eyes.

"You're so annoying, War," Heero muttered, extending his hand to the guy. "Don't mind him, he's just jealous because he hasn't gotten laid in like...a month," he met Duo's eyes pointedly.

"About how long do you honestly think it'd take me to remedy that?" Duo returned smoothly. A challenge.

Heero receded, considering his eyes before looking away.

Really, now?

Wufei looked between them a moment, then started to pour the pasta into the water.

"Hey, guys," Quatre greeted as he moved through the door, then stopped to look at Matt. "Hi."

Matt smiled back, something in him instantly liking the other man. "Hi."

"Who're you?" Quatre returned, toeing his shiny shoes of as he pulled off his jacket.

"Matty," the guy returned easily. "You?"

"I'm called Jason," he explained. "Jason Wire." He moved across the room and offered his hand.

Matt shook it, then tilted his head at Quatre. "You're called? Wire isn't that good a made up last name."

"I was beyond tired, kid," Quatre retorted, tousling his hair as he noticed the bruise. He reached over and pushed the guy's shirt down curiously, then looked at him in confusion.

That got a slight smile, the same abashed sort of acceptance of attention as he indicated Heero with his head. "Ian called it his tramp stamp."

Quatre lowered his hand, fighting his urge to blush as he realized why the boy was actually leaning, quite comfortably, against Heero's groin. "Ah..."

Heero's amused smirk was gone almost instantly as Wufei happily went back to his cooking.

"Yeah...he got a good look at my ass, too," Duo noted, giving Wufei a look that almost qualified as dirty.

"Why are you back so late, anyway?" Wufei asked serenely, nonplussed. Quatre was trying to save-face in front of the newcomer, and the others were trying to make him lose it.

"Anali got back from her vacation," Quatre returned in a mock happy tone. "That meant that everything they'd needed her to sign off on was signed, and they were able to get it all back to me. I know how bad it sucks to wait for someone to come back and finish their job, so I did my whole inbox," he sighed, loosening his tie. "I'm gonna change...is that almost done, F...Ian?"

"Fian?" Matt asked in amusement.

Wufei flashed him a brief grin, then nodded at Quatre.

"Good," Quatre muttered, turning away. "I'm starving."

Heero ran his hands distractedly through his hair, looking around a moment before sighing and meeting Wufei's eyes.

"Huh?"

"I need to do my forms," he explained. "I'm sure he'll get bored of it before I'm done...and I want to do them before I eat. You game to play host for me a bit?"

"Sure," Wufei reassured him.

"What?" Matt asked curiously as Heero stood again.

"Come on, I'll tell you about it," Heero returned, starting away. He was talking quietly, and evidently his words were hypnotizing or something, because Matt seemed to forget the rest of the world existed by the time they got to the end of the stairs.

"You wanted to talk to me?" Duo asked with a grin after the pair, looking back curiously to Wufei.

Wufei considered the others in the apartment a moment, then nodded his head vaguely at Duo's person. "What did you do?"

"At work?" Duo asked blankly.

"No, to Heero," Wufei returned, focusing back on the vegetables.

"What did I do to Heero?" Duo echoed, perplexed. "When?"

"When you two were screwing each other," Wufei returned easily, glancing at his comrade.

Duo was staring at him.

"If you ask me how I know about that I'm going to smack you," Wufei added, giving him a look and picking up the shot glass he'd left on the counter, setting it on the slightly higher counter that made up the bar, in front of the braided pilot.

"Um..."

"He's told me about several interesting exploits of rooms and things you two really _shouldn't_ have been in," Wufei noted somewhat pointedly. "Meaning he's told me just about everything, so don't even bother being embarrassed or trying to hide it."

"I've never been embarrassed or tried to hide it," Duo retorted, mildly offended by that. "I don't get what the hell you're asking me, if he's told you everything."

"Ah, but his memories on instances," Wufei glanced at Duo's mouth with interest. "Only go so far."

That mouth curved into an amused smirk before he downed the shot.

"You can't tell me you don't notice," Wufei added, pulling a noodle out with his spoon to test how far along it was. "Mouths distract him totally."

"I'm good at what I do," Duo retorted, highly amused by that. "When I decide the benefit is beyond the risk, and when my putting out an effort is worth it in the end...I'm damn good at what I do."

"And that's what I'm asking," Wufei retorted, deciding they were edible and flicking off the stovetop. "What do you do?" he met his friend's eyes a moment, then turned to dig out the colander he should have grabbed in the first place.

"It's not something I can't exactly...explain...with my mouth," Duo seemed highly amused by his phrasing. "I'd have to...show you."

Wufei stopped, wondering if it was a good or a bad thing that this point of the conversation had been his aim.

He really needed a drink if he was talking another guy into going down on him when there was nothing holding him to the apartment. ...but Heero's distraction had always interested him, and seeing that his own very slight tonguing had caught his friend's attention just made him curious to know what could have been _so_ good that it'd be _that_ distracting.

Duo tilted his head curiously.

"Uh..." Wufei hesitated, then poured the noodles into the colander.

Duo smirked and looked around. "We might find something amusing to do on this little vacation we're taking here, Fei. Something mutually distracting."

Mutually distracting? Wufei met his eyes.

"It's an exchange, you know?" Duo purred, his eyes languidly wicked in a way that Wufei found oddly interesting...disturbingly interesting was more like it. He hesitated over the noodles, not wanting to agree to this proposed offer, then glanced to the side where Quatre and Trowa were coming from the bedroom.

"Ooh, it's done?" Quatre asked eagerly, bouncing around Trowa to sit beside Duo, then glance between them. "What? What were you two doing?"

Duo shrugged urbanely. "Just talking...Wufei thinks he's got balls, but when you get down to it, all he's got is cock."

Wufei sniggered at that as Quatre gave him an interested look. That was a good one, he was going to remember it and use it on some unsuspecting pain in his ass...

That thought wasn't exactly comforting after what he assumed Duo had been suggesting.

He grinned more.

Quatre gave him the sort of look that read as 'you're such a weird-ass', and looked around to Trowa, who was also looking around.

"Here," Wufei added, scooping sauce over the noodles he'd just put on a plate. "Duo's been here longest so he gets first go...isn't your show on tonight?" he added, meeting Duo's eyes.

Duo looked intrigued as he nodded his agreement, then slid off the stool. "I'm gonna eat and go out, though," he noted. "Quatre's got a show on tonight, too."

Wufei nodded his agreement to that as he scooped vegetables into Trowa's plate.

"Thanks," Trowa muttered, smiling slightly at him, then turning to follow Duo, starting to talk quietly.

"Spill," Quatre ordered quietly, leaning against the counter.

"I asked Duo a question and his answer wasn't negative...but not the form I thought it'd come in...I wonder if I could just pay him off."

"Wufei," Quatre chided sharply, though still quietly.

Wufei snickered and met the guy's eyes before shaking his head. "I didn't mean with money, I doubt I'd have enough to make him turn away from whatever notion he just took in his head anyway...actually, I'm stuck with it if I want it."

"What _is_ it?" Quatre asked dryly.

"BJ," Wufei met his eyes curiously. He knew this was going to embarrass the guy, but it always helped Quatre when he was calm and not teasing with it.

Quatre's eyes widened, his cheeks flared, then he focused again and the reddening eased up. It took a few moment, but it did finally pass. "Why...do you want...Duo...to do that?"

Wufei considered the question, then the movements from the tatami mat above is head. "Heero's told me a lot of shit, you know?" he asked, looking back to Quatre. "And one thing he said is that he," he pointed at Duo, who seemed to be telling Trowa about his day, "has the mouth of a fucking god...and I mean a _fucking_ god," Wufei noted in amusement.

Quatre colored, stayed quiet, calmed, then looked around again before looking back to Wufei. "He does notice mouths a lot," Quatre muttered, looking down, as if embarrassed he'd noticed this fact and embarrassed that he knew where it came from.

"So it made me curious," Wufei concluded, passing Quatre a plate. "I can't seem to care more than that about it, though there's probably some underlying deep dark psychological reason about that. Mike is going to have a hay-day with it."

"You'll tell him?" Quatre asked blankly.

Wufei wondered blandly if it was a bad thing that his roommates knew his psychologist by first name. He grinned slightly at his friend and shook his head. "It'll come out eventually...I can't control my tongue unless it's in something."

Quatre choked and colored at that...which made Wufei laugh happily, then look over his shoulder at Matt, who was watching Duo and Trowa as he reached the end of the stairs. He looked around briefly, then turned and headed toward Wufei, looking to Quatre's plate curiously.

"Here," Wufei returned, passing him the plate he'd been making for himself. "Enjoy," he did the thing where he kissed his fingers, then turned to dig out a couple more plates.

"Thanks," Matt muttered, looking sidelong at Quatre again with a slight smile. "I'm tired...I'm gonna eat and try to nap or head home."

Wufei smirked very slightly.

He really doubted the "head home" option was going to take effect...not until they headed for the colonies.


	3. Chapter 3

**Three**

"Geeze, you're still here?" Trowa muttered blankly to Matt as he sat up and saw the guy looking back at him.

"Good morning to you, too, sunshine," Matt retorted, running a hand through his hair. He rolled over Heero, which got him a grunt, then stood and stretched, looking the room over briefly. "I really need to go home."

"I thought so a day ago," Trowa muttered, laying back down and rolling back over.

"Don't mind him," Duo suggested. "He's not a morning person."

Matt made a considerate noise, then moved fairly quietly across the room and disappeared from the curtain.

Heero had picked him up on Thursday, and Friday had passed with them all running around packing and getting their stuff in actual order. The pair did disappear a time or two, but no one had investigated that, or seemed to care that the kid was sleeping in Heero's bed again. They knew Heero wasn't crass enough to pull shit in their very large mutual bedroom, so his presence had passed unchallenged. It was early Saturday morning, and their flight was leaving at one in the afternoon...and Trowa really _wasn't_ a morning person.

Duo sighed and rolled out of his bed, standing straight and looking to his four friends—they were all watching him. He waited for the bathroom door shut before sighing. "I need to cut my hair."

They all rather woke up at that, blinking at him.

"It's more of a hazard than it's worth," he noted, running his fingers through it. "It gets caked with dust and grime and I have to unbraid it over the tub..."

"I'll hack it off for you," Heero noted helpfully.

Duo grinned, appreciating that. "You're a real peach," he noted sarcastically, then looked around to Wufei.

"You should get it done professionally after he cuts it," Wufei noted. "The guy I get to do mine, huh?"

Duo nodded. He'd had the previous day to come to the same conclusion, he just wasn't sure if he wanted to keep the cut bit or donate it to a wig place. He knew Quatre would cover those options for him at some point, and Trowa would later add some sort of encouraging words—when he needed them, usually.

"Wanna just do it?" Heero asked curiously, sitting up and blinking at him. He rubbed his eyes, considering where he'd left the good scissors.

"I think so," Duo muttered, considering it. "But maybe after I pick up my stuff. I need to tell Victor...make sure he doesn't give Reiver my description with it."

"All right," Heero muttered, shifting back to sit across his bed and look them all over. "Is he annoying you?"

"I think he's funny," Wufei noted. "Brazen little shit."

Duo nodded his consent, moving toward the closet.

"He likes me," Quatre noted. "That's always a start."

They all fell silent, waiting for Trowa. They all knew the question had really been directed at him, but since Heero hadn't specified, they didn't mind adding in their two cents worth.

Trowa sighed. "I'm just tired...he's fine."

Heero nodded his appreciation of that as they all heard the toilet flush and the water run.

"I'm showering to head over to the office," Duo muttered tiredly. "We can figure everything else out after that."

"Right," Heero muttered, looking across the room...to the curtain as it opened.

Matt moved into the area hesitantly, looking around at all of them in mild concern.

"I'm showering," Duo noted.

"I've gotta go home," the guy agreed, looking around to Heero. "I'm leaving tomorrow."

"Where are you going anyway?" Heero asked curiously. They'd gathered the guy was taking his first trip out to the colonies to visit family, just not where that happened to be.

"The L-5 cluster," he returned easily.

Wufei froze.

Duo hesitated in the door, turning to look at the Chinese man briefly.

"I have an uncle there," he added, his face creasing with a frown. "It's...um, you know about A0206, right?"

Who didn't? Duo wondered idly, though he could feel the breathless quality of Wufei.

They were all staring at the kid in blank amazement.

"Well...my family was from there at one point," he shifted slightly. "It...it..."

"W...we know about it," Quatre half stuttered over the first word, trying not to glance at Wufei and nodding encouragingly.

Yeah...we knew more about it than he could probably imagine...

"We'd moved away before," he added, biting his lip. "But my dad's brother had moved back...um...his birthday would have been later this month."

"Oh," Wufei half breathed. "I see..."

"I need to go get packed," he added, still hesitant.

"All right," Heero muttered, hopping up quickly as he probably realized it'd be polite to walk him out—cop a feel or something for good measure.

Duo grinned slightly to himself and moved from the bedroom.

For some reason, he always got the feeling that "fate" hated him...and maybe them, seeing as it was Wufei and Heero who found the kid.

Ah well...maybe he wouldn't disappear on Heero as soon as he realized who they were. Shit, maybe he wouldn't blame Wufei for the death of his uncle.

...and hell, maybe the sky would be green as they took off into it...the great green yonder.

He shook his head, and headed into the bathroom.

- -

The door slammed.

Wufei turned to look at Duo in confusion as Quatre stopped on his way out of the laundry room, which was off the back of the kitchen. They both blinked at Duo as he stormed wordlessly by them and into the bedroom. He normally stopped to take his shoes off, and in light of their departure time being two hours away...that didn't exactly bode well.

"Hey, Duo," Heero greeted from where he was in the bedroom.

"Where's Trowa?" was Duo's terse response...followed by the sound of him landing on top of the closet.

Quatre blinked.

"I'm up here," Trowa returned from where he was in the gym. "What's up?"

"Just counting heads," Duo returned as his motion settled down...stilled.

"Uh..." Heero muttered. "Before you get into that...what's up?"

"Can't cut my hair, Victor's a dumbass."

"Oh."

"Shut-up," Duo retorted.

"Don't be a dick," Heero returned.

There was a noise that sounded like Duo'd started to speak and bit his tongue...and the apartment fell silent.

"I'm gonna toss this on your bed," Quatre muttered to Wufei, indicating the basket of laundry he was carrying. Heero moved from the back room with an exasperated expression as Wufei nodded.

Duo just needed to calm himself down about whatever annoyance had come up...and then he'd tell them what was up.

No use pressing it before then.

Wufei went back to the vegetables he was stir-frying. They had to be to the port a half hour early, which meant they were going to eat, make a last run of their packing, then out.

Heero, who had his phone in hand, finished typing on it and gestured with his head back toward the bedroom. The screens he and Wufei built were tall enough that Duo couldn't see them from the top of it without standing up, but he'd probably feel the question through the air.

Trowa went back into his workout.

Wufei shook his head slightly. Heero rolled his eyes in return, sitting on a stool...and Wufei shrugged at that. No, he didn't get why Duo was as pissy as he was, and Heero was taking it far too much to heart. He'd been the one to prompt the American into talking when he was getting on top of the closet. The only reason to _be_ on top of the closet was to meditate. He'd _asked_ to be snapped at.

Heero gave him a look, probably reading the sentiment from his eyes.

Wufei grinned in response. "Food."

"Oh, good," Quatre muttered, moving from the bedroom. "You hear him, Tro?"

"Yeah, let me hop in the shower," Trowa returned. The machine he was using clanked, and then he started down the steps.

"You eating, War?" Heero called over his shoulder.

That got no response.

"Was it because he's mediating or because I called him War?" Heero asked Wufei curiously.

"Leave him alone," Wufei chided, starting to serve up the food. "Give him time to calm back down."

"If he wants me to hack his hair off..." Heero started.

"Didn't you hear him?" Wufei demanded. "He said he can't cut it off because Victor's an idiot."

"He sent Reiver a _picture_ of me," Duo snapped.

Wufei grinned slightly. "Oh?"

"Yes!" Duo spat back, hopping to his feet and walking to the edge of the cupboard so he could look down at them. "Made sure the braid was obvious! I've been telling him I want to cut it."

"You say that sometimes," Quatre semi-soothed. "You haven't done it yet."

That got him a level look.

"Oh calm down and come eat," Trowa muttered. "We can cut it off before you go back to work. Vic meant well, you know he did."

"Do you have _any_ idea how hard it is to work myself up to cutting it?" Duo demanded in return. "It took me the last _month_."

They exchanged wary looks.

Duo sighed and turned away, pacing off down the mats.

"You gonna come get food?" Wufei asked curiously.

"Yeah, give me a minute," Duo returned resignedly. It only took a moment before they heard him landing, but the sound of Heero's phone vibrating across the countertop made them all jump...and caused Wufei to reach for his firearm.

That was an awesome reaction...

Heero picked the phone up, his contact with it making the vibration stop, then read whatever it said and grinned. He hit a few buttons...then his thumb flew across the keys before he set the phone back down...and realized they were all watching him.

"What?"

"I really want to ask you who that is," Trowa returned, studying the man. "But I really think I don't need to."

"What?" Heero protested, good humor replacing the confusion. "He was talking about me running by his place on our way to the port...but since we're all taking the same car..."

Wufei snorted, passing Duo a bowl as he joined the group.

"So your handjob on the way out wasn't enough?" Trowa demanded dryly.

Quatre sputtered and coughed, his cheeks flaring their red color.

"With...a big open room...you jacked your boy off?" Duo asked Heero almost blankly.

"No I didn't!" Heero protested, grinning between Duo and Trowa. "Tell'em, Fei...I didn't do it."

"What were doing then?" Wufei returned dryly. "He was breathing pretty hard there."

"It was just a kiss!" Heero protested, rising happily to the bait. "I wouldn't _do_ anything in the same room as you dumbasses!"

"Breath, Quatre..." Trowa muttered, focusing on the flaming blond. "Come on...calm down...you need help?"

"I'm fine..." Quatre croaked, though he'd bent forward to hide his face and still seemed a bit wheezy.

"Oh...uh...sorry, Q," Heero muttered, blinking down at him. "I didn't mean to..."

"Go take your shower, Trowa," Quatre coughed. "We need to get ready to leave."

Trowa considered him skeptically a moment, then nodded and turned into the bathroom.

"I'm gonna go sit at the...on the couch," Quatre added, pulling away from the breakfast bar. "Watch some tv..."

Duo sniggered slightly as Heero grinned after him.

"You're an ass," Wufei informed Duo happily.

"I'm not the one palming another guy in the main room of the apartment," Duo retorted, settling into his seat.

"Was he really that loud?" Heero muttered quietly to Wufei. "I thought the shower covered it."

Duo choked...though it wasn't nearly as incapacitating as Quatre's had been.

Wufei gave Heero a very level look...and focused on his food.

- -

Trowa wanted to tell Heero to shut up, but he had the definite impression that wouldn't be appreciated. The others were bearing with his ramblings in good humor, even Quatre, so he knew it had to just be him. He hadn't really been ready to wake up, and on a commercial flight with no particular guard set, he hadn't been able to more than catnap on the trip. That left him open to hearing pretty much all of Heero's sentiments concerning the little half-Asian boy.

Actually, Trowa was pretty sure that Quatre had fallen asleep, considering the more detailed route the mutterings had taken an hour or two after take off.

"But Tro's gonna get annoyed with my muttering, so I'm going to stop," Heero summed up.

Trowa snapped his head around to look at Heero in confusion.

Heero grinned back at him. "Tell me I'm wrong."

"I didn't _sleep_," Trowa noted. "I drowsed a bit...I was _keeping_ myself from telling you to shut up."

Heero sniggered.

"Really?" Wufei sounded perturbed. "I fell asleep...so did Quatre. I thought the going thought process was Heero and Duo at point."

They blinked at each other.

"Let's just get our car and get out of here," Duo suggested, yawning as he shifted his carry-on from one shoulder to the other. "We still have to get through customs before we can get to the hotel."

"What are we doing for dinner?" Heero muttered with a yawn.

"I don't want to cook," Wufei noted.

"Good," Quatre muttered, sounding mildly amused. "Asian is good and all..."

"Especially with a body like that," Duo noted.

Heero snickered.

"But I'd _like_ some American," Quatre half-spat back.

Duo turned and made a 'come-get-me' gesture.

Quatre's cheeks flared, though he did laugh at that.

Trowa sighed slightly. "We can find a restaurant after we check in, right?"

They all looked at him, frowning slightly.

"What?"

"What's the matter?" Wufei returned. "You've been tetchy the last few days."

Trowa gave him a level look.

"If something's the matter," Heero noted, "you can talk with me about it...I can't say I'll understand, but it'll help you organize your thoughts to talk to him or him..." he pointed at Duo and Quatre.

Trowa blinked at him.

"We're all friends, right?" Duo agreed. "If something's the matter..."

"I just don't appreciate some little boy coming into our house," Trowa retorted. "I don't like having to call you by those other names...and I _really_ don't appreciate you _doing_ things in the house," he looked pointedly at Heero.

Heero stopped walking, obviously considering the meanings behind the comment. He decided that amusement was okay after a moment and grinned at Trowa.

"The laundry room _smelled_ like the two of you," Trowa added irritably, turning away.

"Whose game to help get him laid?" Duo asked Wufei dryly.

Wufei grinned back. He didn't see why the question'd had to be _asked_.

Trowa turned on them, glaring.

"No one agreed," Heero soothed quickly, moving in to the other's side. "Calm down...you can take the single room, huh? Get away from us for a while."

...that was an appealing idea, and Trowa didn't want to admit that.

"What if I want to get away from you for a while?" Quatre muttered dryly. His cheeks were a shade of pink that suggested he'd controlled a blush.

"Okay...I'll take the single," Heero said happily. "You and Tro can have that room and the rest of us can be forbidden to enter—call it a club-house."

Quatre snorted at that, rolling his eyes.

Trowa grinned briefly at the blond, appreciating the stupid comment in spite of his decision to be irritable.

They were, after all, his friends. There was no point in being bitchy when they were trying to amuse him. If he kept it up too long, they'd have him rolling laughing before the sun set—and that didn't help the pride.

Well...it'd help _their_ pride, thinking of it as a pride of lions...but it wouldn't help _his_ personal pride...

Trowa shook his head slightly, and followed Duo toward the baggage collection. They were now officially on vacation. What was the point of being grumpy?

- -

"Hey!" Wufei protested.

Heero jumped, turning to look at the Chinese man as Duo started snickering wickedly. A moment later, he'd focused on the door—and a piece of paper taped to it.

_Real boys only_.

"We're men, Wufei," Heero reminded the guy pointedly.

It made Trowa start laughing on the other side of the door.

"What?" Quatre asked blankly.

"Who's shacking up?" Duo muttered, grinning as he looked between them. "I'll take the single or share, I don't care."

"That's a problem," Heero noted, looking to Wufei.

"Yeah," Wufei agreed, then shrugged. "I'll take the single here...one of you can have the single in L-2, huh?"

"Wait," Duo blinked as he thought. "I have to get up early Monday. You won't want to be waking up at six, huh?"

"Good point," Heero agreed. "So you take it here and Wufei can have the next one?"

Wufei shrugged. He didn't particularly care. Until he found someone to stay the night with him—of the female variety—he was perfectly game to share a room.

"Good," Duo muttered, realizing the plans had been set and sighing as he organized the keys in his hand and passed a little envelope over to Wufei. "So," he raised his voice slightly, "we can meet in the hall in five to go find food."

"All right," Trowa returned, though he wasn't by the door anymore.

Wufei nodded, separating one of the keys from the thing and sliding it through the lock.

The room wasn't huge, but it was decently sized. There was plenty of room for the two occupants.

"I hadn't realized Trowa was against having Matty around," Heero muttered as he moved to set his stuff on the bed by the door. "You're not going to let me set up hall sensors, are you?"

"Not here," Wufei retorted, giving him a look. "If we get a room at the end of a hall, it'll be fine, but people might walk through just to walk through."

"I hate not having security set up," Heero protested, giving him a look.

"So set it up over the door and window if you _really_ need it," Wufei retorted.

"I'll wake up if someone comes _in_," that was an offensive suggestion.

Wufei gave Heero a very level look.

"I just want to know..."

"You'll hook it up to your phone and the phone will buzz every time someone triggers it—even if it _is_ only Maxwell or Winner..."

"No! You'll all give me your phones and let me put the trig in it...so it won't react when you have it."

"You're going to whine about this until I give in, aren't you?" Wufei demanded dryly.

"In case you _hadn't_ noticed, we're not in a _secure_ location," Heero snapped.

Wufei huffed at him, then gave over, rolling his eyes. "Get the others to consent and I'll hush."

"Fine," Heero muttered, his hackles settling, though they were still stiff. His phone was out in a moment and he started typing.

"You are _not_ bitching to your little girlfriend about that, are you?" Wufei snapped. The entire flight over, Heero'd been exchanging text messages with the kid. "How are you _that_ enthralled by him?"

That brought the wicked grin to the fore as he considered if Wufei actually wanted the answer...that and the fact that there was no one around to be embarrassed or flustered. "He shoved me on the bed and completely took control...every time I tried something he blocked it...you can't tell me you don't get that way when one of your little bitches takes over."

Wufei laughed, appreciating that.

"Open up," Duo ordered from the hall, pounding on the door.

Heero turned and reached the door in two strides, flinging it open.

"Put the damn program on mine," the American added, passing his phone over. "I'm changing, then I'll be ready to go."

"All right," Heero muttered, looking happy.

"I want my phone to have the alarm on it, too," Duo noted pointedly, meeting his eyes.

"There'd be no point in only yours having it," Trowa agreed, moving from his room with his and Quatre's phones. He passed those over.

"It'll take a moment to set the program up," Heero noted, looking to Trowa's room. "We'll just leave this open..."

"You should set up the sensors," Trowa noted to Wufei. "I know you know how."

Wufei returned an extremely level look before nodding his consent. He thought the motion sensors were pointless in the middle of a hotel. They'd end up causing more harm than help...but he did understand the want of even the most basic of precautions.

"Ha," Heero muttered triumphantly, turning and starting to pull his laptop out.

"Ha my ass," Wufei retorted. Trowa and Duo had disappeared though. "You want the damn things at the edge of the rooms?"

"Uh...no, Wufei, I want them across the doors," Heero retorted.

"I suggested that in the first place," Wufei returned, meeting his eyes.

Heero sniggered and tossed the sensors to him.

Wufei sighed, tossing his phone to Heero, then stepped out of the room and looked the hall over. He assumed the edge of their room was good for one, but he'd have to duck into the other rooms to see how far they went.

Honestly, the sensors were pointless...there was already a woman watching him with interest as she moved toward him.

"Evening," he greeted her, running his hand over the carpet like he was looking for something.

"You lose something?" she asked curiously, hesitating near him.

"Screw for my glasses," he agreed, making a face. "It can't be far..."

"Oh...I hate that," she noted, returning the look, then hopped quickly past him and moved on.

Hostile or bystander?

Wufei ran her actions through his mind a few times as he watched her walk away, then rolled his eye.

Bystander.

He was in a hotel in the middle of L-1 with no information of underground activities or possible threats. He wasn't setting up a perimeter because of actual danger, it was assumed danger.

He hated it when Heero got him to do those details, it always plucked his paranoia.

He moved across the hall, eyeing the wall to find the right spot. If they weren't directly across from each other, a piece of dust could set off the sensor.

"I think the other ones should be about right here," Duo noted, moving from his room and moving down the hall a few steps. "This is about the edge of my room."

"Check theirs," Wufei grunted back, rising from his knees and interrupting the beam.

...at least two phones screeched their sirens and Heero cried out in alarm at the same moment.

Wufei started laughing.

"That was mean," Duo chided, though he was grinning.

"I think this is pointless," Wufei returned, rolling his eyes. "I'm only doing this because it's majority, which means I'm annoyed with him."

"You're so mature it's heart-warming," Duo returned dryly, then focused on the hall. He'd glanced into the other pilots' bedroom and walked a few steps up the hall, considering the distance, then nodded and indicated the wall.

"Thanks," Wufei noted dryly, crouching down and smacking the first one into place.

"I'd do it, but I can't ever get them lined up first try," Duo added, watching further. "Are you setting up the window ones?"

"May as well go full-blown paranoia," Wufei agreed, rolling his eyes. "Give me a couple moments and I'll get the rest of the stupid things." ...and he triggered that sensor.

At least three phones beeped.

He chuckled wickedly.

"I'm going to wake your ass up," Heero informed him grumpily as he moved back into their room. "I'm going to wait until you're in the deepest most restful layer of sleep and scare the _shit_ out of you."

Wufei grinned wickedly at him and grabbed a handful more of sensors out. It took him a moment to pair them—the things were sold in pairs, but could be mated any which way. Heero always had two pairs primed, and the rest required minute flickering.

"Got it," Heero noted, looking up at him. "Can you not set them off anymore?"

"I was just making sure they were aligned," Wufei retorted.

"Like you've ever did them wrong," Heero denied that, giving him a look.

"Your faith is reassuring," Wufei noted, then turned and moved from the room.

Heero didn't seem to have a comment for that, not that Wufei had expected one, and he moved into Duo's room quietly. Duo glanced at him briefly from where he was buttoning his jeans, then focused back on what he was doing.

It didn't take Wufei more than a few seconds to have the sensors set up. "The curtains will set them off," Wufei warned his friend, priming the second pair.

"Got it," Heero called from the other room.

"Just be careful...the going theory is that if you move the curtain it'll happen once, but if someone goes through they won't think to settle the curtains back."

"Right," Duo agreed, pulling on a boot.

Wufei moved into the hall, then tucked silently into Quatre and Trowa's room...pulling the piece of paper with him as he did so.

"Wufei!" Quatre squawked as Trowa looked at him. He was pulling his own boots on, sitting on his bed.

"Sorry, didn't mean to startle you," Wufei returned, dropping the partially crumpled piece of paper in his friend's lap as he moved up to their window.

"What is this?" Quatre asked, then read the thing and blinked at it.

"Huh?" Trowa asked, moving from the bathroom to look between them, then grinned at the blond as he noticed the paper.

"Wow," Quatre muttered, setting the thing on his bed as he started on his second boot.

"The curtains will trigger this," Wufei informed them, eyeing the level. "If you mess with them, be sure to stop the swinging...anyone sneaking in won't think to."

Trowa nodded.

"I gotta do ours now," Wufei added with a sigh...and left the room.

He needed to figure out something fun to do that wasn't baiting Heero. It was true he hadn't wanted to go on the stupid tour to begin with, but that didn't mean he should give into the morose pouting he was feeling. Besides, continually baiting Heero would eventually lead to actual retaliation. That could get damn fun, but it took a bit of an effort to annoy Heero sufficiently to get the reaction. That tended to last a couple days, and that wasn't fair for poor Heero.

Heero was grinning again as he set his phone back on the bed, looking up to Wufei.

"I'm going to hack into your phone and get his number," Wufei noted, priming the third set.

"Got it...why? His number is..."

"No! I want to hack your phone," Wufei protested. "I want to see if your sainted security can hold out to me."

Heero considered that a moment as Wufei set the sensor on the wall. "...you know my passwords," he noted.

Wufei stopped, turning to look at him.

"How can you hack it if you have the passwords?" Heero added, looking curious.

Wufei snorted, moving to the far wall to set up the final bit of useless security.

"I've set the urgency levels low," Heero added. "And I put the room reads weighted toward the room phones."

"All right," Wufei muttered, moving back to his suitcase.

"Hold on," Heero added, fiddling with a couple of the phones. "There...here."

Wufei took his from the guy, then stopped as he realized his address book was open.

"If I don't try to hide it from you," Heero noted in amusement, "you won't be so eager to hunt it down. I just synced the information up with mine...you have his full address, name, phone number, home number...and itinerary."

Wufei opened the new entry and paged down it with interest, then looked to Heero with a raised eyebrow.

Heero grinned back at him and gathered up the rest of the phones. "Let's go...I'm starving."

'_Hey, Matty...it's Fian,_' Wufei grinned slightly. The kid had taken to calling him that. '_This is my number...Max just synced us up. _'

It took a moment before he got a response...and he highly appreciated it. '_Of course he did...he shares everything with you, doesn't he? May as well bring lube next time I'm around...I'm sure you're invited. _'

Wufei started laughing wickedly. '_You're not bugged that he did, are you? _'

'_Nah...kinda surprised it took as long as it did. What're you up to?_'

'_Same thing as Max, kid...we're all in it together._'

'_Oh, oh...sorry ~dryly~ you're all in everything together, aren't you?_'

'_You don't even know the half of it,_' Wufei agreed, realizing that he'd found his 'something else to do.' '_When you get up here, take a real DEEP breath,_' Wufei added as the group of them moved into the open. The smell of the recycled air was kind of like a familiar friend. '_You'll LOVE it._'

'_I can read your sarcasm, fackass,_' Matty returned pleasantly. '_Besides, Max already warned me about it._'

'_Damn...ah well. Fackass?_'

'_Kinda like Fian. _'

Wufei grinned.

"Dear lord, you're doing it, too?" Duo demanded, rounding on him.

Heero and Wufei looked up to him blankly.

"Man," Duo muttered sidelong to Trowa. "I need to get my finger in the pot before all the good stuff's gone."

Trowa rolled his eyes.

"He gave it to me willingly," Quatre informed them happily, pulling his phone out. "Wonder if he'll appreciate all three of us bugging him."

"Here," Duo muttered, taking Heero's phone. "I don't wanna miss out...you in, Trowa? His number is nine-two-seven, four-eight-one, two-one three-nine."

Trowa rolled his eyes, but did pull his phone out.

'_Yay! We're all obnoxious!_' Wufei informed the guy happily. '_What do we want to eat?_'

Heero took his phone back when it buzzed, then looked up and around to Wufei, raising an eyebrow.

"What?"

"What _do_ we want to eat?" Heero retorted.

"I got the claim," Quatre reminded them, starting to type. "We get American."


	4. Chapter 4

**Four**

Duo genuinely wondered what Matty thought about Heero giving them all his phone number. He actually seemed to appreciate the attention, sort of like he was okay with wandering around their apartment when Heero was doing his forms. It was probably an entirely new situation for him to have so many guys paying him mind at once.

Did he realize that Wufei was straight? It wasn't hard to get that Trowa and Quatre were, they almost seemed to walk around with it stamped on their foreheads...but Wufei was a little different.

Duo pushed through the doors to the office that Victor ran his space-end through.

"Mr. Temblar?" the receptionist asked, taking in his braid.

"Good morning...Miss?"

"Devi," she returned. "I'm Anita Devi."

"Good morning," Duo repeated, shaking her hand. "Is Mr. Reiver here yet?"

"He should be any moment now...ooh, is that the kit?" she asked, leading Duo toward a room behind her.

"It's my toothbrush," Duo retorted dryly.

She laughed happily at that, then licked her lips as she looked to it, then up at him.

He considered her a moment, very aware that this was her asking to see what he had in it, then shook his head and flicked it open.

She made a little happy noise, leaning forward.

"You can touch," Duo reassured her, shoving the case toward her. "You never been to Earth?"

"No," she returned, pulling out a piece of wood and raising it to her nose to sniff it. "I always wanted to go...but I can't afford the ticket, let alone a place to stay there."

"You should try for the next temp position," Duo muttered, straightening his tie.

"I don't have any experience," she protested, looking up at him.

"You never know unless you try," he shrugged, then turned to the white board and picked up a pen. "There's coffee and breakfast stuff around, right?"

"Oh, of course," she set the hunk of wood down and gave him an embarrassed sort of look. "I'll go get it."

"Sugar and creamer," he reminded her, then focused back on the sketch he was making of the house. He had pictures on his phone and on a memory stick...Victor's general thought-process was to spoil his clients. He'd been encouraged to take random pictures on the phone and to say that they were just him thinking the client would like to see the "real" work. He was game to play along, though. If he did a good enough job, he was promised a bonus. Victor had also pulled him aside to note that he was very aware that Duo was in charge of the house, but the client had been paying for Victor's name, so he would give him credit, but not all of it.

Victor was sort of an ass—but Duo completely understood where he was coming from. It didn't hurt that he liked Duo, either. Duo didn't mind him on a personal level, he was pleasant enough...and on the professional level he was rather highly sought after...but on the professional level he was an ass. He was happy to rely on Duo, though, and promised him the lion's share of the bonus.

He wasn't entirely stupid.

Duo shook his head, making the final markings for his picture.

"Here's the coffee," Anita muttered, moving into the room with a tray of the stuff. "We'll bring in a breakfast bar in a moment...if that's all right."

Duo smiled at her and nodded, moving back to his bag to pull out his laptop.

She hesitated a moment, then disappeared.

He booted up his computer...and stopped as his phone buzzed.

He pulled the thing from his pocket and smirked very slightly at Matty's name.

'_You're the only one who hasn't told me good morning,_' it read. '_You too good for me?_'

'_I'm about to cinch a deal that'll gross my company more money than you make in a working year...and you're worried that I'm not telling you good morning? _'

He slapped the memory card into his computer, then turned and pulled the projector cords from the machine...and his phone buzzed again.

'_Well excuse me. I didn't think you were a grumpy morning person._'

Duo grinned, listening a moment to make sure his client wasn't about to walk in. '_I'm fully showered, dressed in a 3 piece suit. The material is made of the finest ingredients and my shoes are so polished I could look up skirts and have a mirror view...if I'm caught texting on THIS job, it may be WORTH my job. I'll tell you good morning when I'm done and mutter sweet nothings in your ear until you swoon...as long as you wait until I text you back._'

'_Oh...sorry. I didn't realize you were that busy._'

'_Don't worry about it Willy...Billy...Billy-bob._' He knew the kid would have to think about that one. His last name was Williams...it was a bit of a stretch, but it was sort of like him running around calling Wufei 'Fian.'

'_Billy-bob? You're totally going to explain that to me when it's not worth more than my car._'

Duo grinned tucked the phone away.

"Here's the waffle maker," Anita muttered, coming in as he turned back to plug the cords in. "The mix is being separated...and we'll bring in a few donuts and some muffins in a moment...is that good?"

"Wonderful," Duo reassured her, smiling again.

She smiled back and moved into the lobby again.

Duo started the projector, bringing up the pictures.

Really...he'd rather exchange casual insults with the nineteen year old...but priorities were priorities...and his happened to include putting food on the table.

He pulled his phone out...and altered the pax settings to only open messages for him for good measure. He also silenced the incoming texting, calling, and chat request. He didn't really trust his brethren to be able to leave him alone—they were notoriously bad at leaving people alone when they _really_ needed to be.

...it was part of their charm.

- -

"He's ignoring us!" Wufei cried, laughing happily as he dropped back across his bed. "How can he ignore us!"

Quatre sniggered. He was laying on his stomach at the foot of Wufei's bed with his knees bent and his feet in the air. "Dear diary," he muttered, typing on his phone, "we were ignored today by Duo...we think he might be mad at us. I know there's this logical thing called a job that he's doing...and that texting his best boyfriends forever might be seen as uncouth...but we really think he might be upset..."

Wufei laughed even more.

"Who's hungry?" Heero muttered, moving into the room with a tray of food.

"I am! I am!" Quatre enthusiastically bounced to his feet.

"Heero, if you can knock them both out for the next hour," Trowa muttered, "I'll do anything you want me to."

"What?" Heero asked in amusement, setting the tray of food on the foot of his bed.

"He's being a stick-in-the-mud," Wufei explained, leaning forward to study the food. "I'm hungry."

"Here, hush," Heero retorted, tossing a burger at him.

Wufei's phone buzzed...and he squeaked, putting the burger down. "Uh...you two-bit whore, I know you're stalking me...don't make me hunt you down and teach you a lesson." Wufei all but giggled wickedly.

Quatre's phone buzzed, and he tilted his head. He grinned as he opened his message and looked up to Heero. "You still in with me on the plan? We can get the Chinese one muzzled with the full assistance of Mad-Max...let me know quick before Ian runs."

Heero grinned his Mad-Max grin at that.

Trowa's phone buzzed and he frowned as he pulled it out and looked at it, then grinned slightly. "You've been neglecting me, I feel unloved."

Heero's phone buzzed as well, and he pulled it out with a grin...and started laughing.

"What?" Wufei asked curiously, bouncing slightly. "What did he say?"

"You picked me up lunch, right?" Heero read, grinning more. "I'm starving, I'll be back in about five minutes. I hope it doesn't get cold."

Wufei started laughing.

Quatre perked up. "I'm telling Matty!"

- -

"He was licking my boots when I walked out," Duo summed up his day's business. "Purring and nuzzling against me."

Heero appreciated Duo's simmering pride. When he pulled something off, when he won his own personal games, his personality and tone...

"You had him eating out of your hand?" Wufei grinned. "Give him a sweet treat to keep him willing?"

Duo flashed him a wicked grin.

"So he picked all his wood?" Quatre asked lazily. He was laying on one side of Wufei's bed, and the Chinese man was on the other with the pillows supporting him. Trowa was similarly stretched out on Heero's bed, and Heero was sitting cross-legged by the foot. Duo seemed to be possessed by the energy of his success and had been languidly pacing between the ends of the beds and the television.

"His wood, his countertops...the stone for his mantle," Duo shook his head. "We figured he'd be more difficult about it, but I'd been happily showing him the pictures on the projector and flicking my phone at him..." he gave them all very level looks.

"Why were you giving him your _phone?_" Wufei demanded, mildly horrified. He'd been texting his friend fairly consistently.

"I took pictures of the site with it," Duo returned in a severely controlled tone. "You're damn lucky I use pax or he'd have been horrified."

Wufei's raven grin spread wickedly across his face.

Pax was a program that could choose what functions to pursue depending on who was holding the phone. It was widely promoted in the true business cultures.

"Yeah," Duo agreed, rolling his eyes. "I think he noted the text count piling up, though."

"Sorry...I'd never heard you to share your phone before," Wufei apologized, sighing and shifting back. "I wouldn't have done it so much if I'd realized."

"Me neither," Quatre agreed. "Sorry, Fei...but you gave pax a run for its money, huh?"

Duo laughed, then sighed and moved to sit at the foot of Heero's bed.

His phone started ringing.

"Matty!" Quatre piped up, his eyes sparkling.

"Shit, I told him I'd text him," Duo noted, looking to the face of the phone. "But no...it's Vic. Hold on...hello?"

They couldn't quite make out what the man was saying, but what they could hear sounded pleased enough.

"So what were you thinking for dinner tonight?" Wufei asked quietly, focusing on Quatre. The rest didn't seem to give too big a damn about what food they ate.

"I dunno, we should just find another diner," Quatre returned. "The one last night wasn't that great."

"Agreed," Wufei returned, looking to Duo, who pushed himself up tiredly from where he'd sat.

"Yeah," Duo muttered. "He seemed pretty pleased when he left." He flashed Heero a wicked grin at his own understatement.

"You always make Asian stuff," Quatre added thoughtfully. "I want to try other stuff...like...German or Spanish...probably Spanish, huh?"

"German can get a bit strange, and a bunch of it's sunk into the American...so Spanish would probably be the better bet...but you know, there's like Thai and Japanese...Korean. I usually just make the Chinese stuff."

"Heero seems happy enough with it," Quatre countered.

"Thai is different, though," Wufei reminded him. "Hell, we could try some Indian, too."

"Maybe," Quatre looked speculative. "We can see what the others say."

"You know they don't care," Wufei retorted. "But whatever."

"Yeah...well, my friends are all sitting here waiting for me," Duo noted strategically pointed. "We're discussing which nationality of food is more appealing...uh-huh. Yeah...well, I'm glad he's happy..." he laughed wickedly, sitting back down. "Yeah, but your ideas only go so far. You know I delivered in there, so don't even pretend he wasn't trying to hump my leg with excitement."

Heero laughed wickedly.

"That's your _boss!_" Trowa protested, smacking at Duo's arm with his foot.

Duo laughed and gestured Trowa away. "Yeah...yeah, I will. You too...have a good one. Sure, I'll get a couple pictures for your amusement and maybe pick you some sort of...souvenir up...yeah. All right, thanks, Vic...yeah. Uh-huh...bye."

He ended the call, then smacked Trowa's leg.

"Don't!" Trowa protested, rubbing the spot.

"I really really need to _do_ something," Duo informed them all pointedly. "It's only three, it's not like we need to think about supper. Come on...what all does L-1 boast for entertainment?"

They all looked to each other, thinking about that.

"We can jump colonies, too," Heero noted. "In the cluster...it's like an hour's ride."

"So let's go," Duo muttered, looking around. "I don't want to sit here anymore."

Quatre considered Wufei a long moment, then used his feet...to shove Wufei off the bed.

- -

Trowa was grateful to whatever gods of prosperity and longevity that Heero or Wufei could come up with that they were only spending two days per colony. All told, they had four days on L-1. The first day had only been a handful of hours, the second day was supposed to consist of Duo readying his presentation, Monday had been the presentation itself, and then they had that evening and Tuesday. Their flight was leaving late Tuesday.

L-2 had a chipper feeling to it that came off in Duo's personality. Everyone smiling and pointing out that 'it's not worth worrying about.' The atmosphere was one of fun and good times...but late at night, like it was, the truth came out. Over a pint of some store-specialty beer, or with the extensive help of a bottle of vodka, the L-2 patrons slowly hunched forward and started muttering their woes.

Duo's energy level had spazzed their second day of being on L-1, and it had ended with him being the only one to stay awake for the flight to the next cluster. It had further hitched up as they went to meet up with the friends Duo had contacted before the trip.

Trowa knew Duo hadn't really wanted to go on the trip, and hadn't really wanted to talk to these old friends...and the feeling was made worse by the fact that none of the friends seemed to have _done_ anything.

They'd gone home. They'd been a bit detached from Duo anyway, specifically on hearing what his job was now. They'd laughed and teased him for being 'some sort of big-wig,' but over their watery beer had admitted that they had tried to get better than what they had. They really had tried...but who wanted an L-2 street rat? They'd made due, and maybe if Duo could find them somewhere to work in his...no? No, he was a street rat, too, wasn't he? He'd gotten the luck of the draw.

For some reason, they didn't seem to realize that draw had been for the losing. He'd fought in two wars, he'd killed more men than he dared remember...and he'd been trained to be _much_ more than a street urchin from a colony that hadn't fared well.

Trowa was glad they left.

Wufei had found a pretty girl in the crowd and was busily making plans with Heero to corner her and see if he could get lucky—but they all knew it was really him trying to get a rise out of Duo...trying to put him back in the stage of manic energy he'd been in all morning.

"Let's go," Quatre muttered tiredly, pulling his jacket off the back of his seat. "I wanna get out of here."

Evidently he'd had enough of the somber atmosphere, too.

"Yeah, good idea, Q," Duo agreed instantly, rising to his feet and considering the straight vodka he'd had poured into his cup. He was smoking, too. Duo wasn't a consistent smoker, but none of them begrudged his attempt at distraction.

He downed the glass...without shuddering. He carried it off like he'd taken the last drink of his pop.

Trowa...almost...envied that. He may have more if it had been rum.

"I don't get the girl?" Wufei protested, though he was rising to his feet and collecting his own cup and jacket.

"You really need something, we can play tonight," Duo retorted, pulling his jacket on.

"It's worth your time," Heero piped up.

Wufei flashed them both grins...but didn't pursue it.

He hadn't really meant it anyway.

- -

Quatre sighed as Duo puked again, wondering vaguely if it was a bad thing he was glad he'd roomed with Trowa again. Heero was in there with Duo, and who knew if he was ignoring the other pilot, or helping him. ...and as far as Quatre was aware, Wufei had gone back to the club before they'd even reached the hotel and picked up the girl. He'd heard her at one point, it just hadn't lasted very long.

What a drag.

Quatre rolled over.

The point where Wufei had gone back to the bar was the point where Duo stopped at the liquor store and picked up a bottle of vodka. The four of them, he, Heero, Trowa, and Duo, had hung out in Heero and Duo's room for half that bottle, then left the others to their own devices.

He'd gathered that neither Duo nor Wufei had wanted to take the vacation, but Heero obviously had, and he was going to be happy to see his sisters. They had to stop by L-3 and Trowa's surrogate sister Cathy first, but...

Why were they even going to L-5?

He rolled over again, hearing Duo have another go at the toilet.

"He must have finished the bottle," Trowa noted quietly.

"You are awake?" Quatre muttered tiredly, then rolled onto his back to study the ceiling. "You wanted to do the tour, didn't you?"

"Yeah," Trowa agreed. "I mean...I wanted to go to L-3 and L-4...and Duo needed L-1...but I don't see why we stopped here."

"Duo set it up," Quatre noted quietly. "Maybe we should just hang out with my family instead of going to L-5? I don't see a point in going there, never had."

"He needs to see the memorial," Trowa noted pointedly. "He needs to see if any of the survivors were his friends."

"Couldn't we do that in advance?" Quatre protested. "It seems needlessly cruel."

Trowa made a thoughtful noise that neither agreed nor disagreed.

Quatre sighed and pushed up. "I'm going to check on him."

"Fine," Trowa returned. "I'm showering."

Quatre left the room quietly, pushing into Heero and Duo's room. The door was cracked...so evidently Heero'd figured they'd come.

"I can't braid," Heero noted from the bathroom. "Quatre?"

"Yeah," Quatre agreed, moving to the bathroom door.

Duo looked back over his shoulder at Quatre in mild amusement...miserable, but still present. "You wanna help?"

"I could hack it off," Heero noted pointedly. It sounded like he'd said it before. He was holding the massive amount of hair between his hands, though some of it was still falling free.

Quatre grinned back, moving to take the hair and straighten it out down the man's back. It only took him a moment to have the clumps separated.

He wasn't _good_ at braiding...but he could do it.

"He ignored me last time I said it, too," Heero noted dryly, sitting back. He was on the edge of the tub. "He wanted me to do it a couple days ago and now he's ignoring me."

"Don't pester," Quatre retorted, working his way down the thing. "You okay, Duo?"

"I will be in a minute," Duo returned, then groaned. "After I puke again..."

"I took the bottle away from him before he could finish it," Heero informed Quatre almost pointedly.

"Oh, shut up..." Duo groaned more, then his breath caught.

Quatre hook the fastener on the end of the hair...and darted from the bathroom.

Duo started laughing...and puked.

"What? You don't want to puke today, Winner?" Heero sounded amused.

"Screw you," Quatre returned.

Duo laughed somewhat again...but that didn't properly work, so he finished his heave before groaning miserably as the toilet flushed. "Quit _doing_ that..."

"It's gonna sicken you either way," Heero retorted. "You done yet?"

"I should be," Duo agreed. "Don't come in yet, Q..."

Quatre hesitated as the water ran.

"Get me my toothbrush?" Duo asked after a moment. "I should be...done for now...god, my mouth is nasty..."

Heero moved from the bathroom, casting Quatre a mildly amused look, then dug into Duo's bag.

"You gonna want to lay down?" Quatre muttered, moving around to sit on the bed closer to the window.

"I need some more sleep," Duo agreed as Heero moved back in. "Thanks...I...it shouldn't be more than an hour or two."

"Okay...I'm not ready to be up yet, either."

"You and Tro have a falling out?"

Quatre snorted as the guy started brushing his teeth.

"He'll be okay now," Heero muttered, moving to the bathroom door. "Why don't you go back to bed?"

Quatre considered that a long moment, then nodded his agreement.

- -

'_You're going to L-3 tonight, right?_'

Heero agreed, tossing his socks onto the bed.

'_What time? -bounces- we're going tonight!_'

...that was interesting.

'_Our flight is at six,_' Heero noted. '_We won't get there until seven._'

'_NO! You HAVE to get there by five! If you're not there at five my dad and my uncle will persist that they aren't leaving me behind and I'll have to go back out to their place...I wanted to spend the night with you._'

...that was happening. Heero wasn't quite sure how, but that was happening.

Duo made an amused noise from the bathroom. "Your girlfriend is begging me to move our flight forward...why does he think I'm in charge of the trip?"

"Open the door and talk to me," Heero retorted, setting his phone down to start on his socks. "I can't bloody hear you."

There was a moment before the door swung open and the man looked around the edge of the door at him levelly. He had the end of his hair in a towel, but jeans on.

"I don't know why he thinks you're in charge," Heero added. "Probably because he knows it was because of you we were coming up. I want an earlier flight...I'd imagine you really do...and the others shouldn't be hesitant at all."

"Agreed," Duo muttered. "Run it by them."

'_Did he say yes?_'

Heero grinned at the phone. '_We're getting the consensus. I'm asking the others._'

'_I will!_'

"He said he'd ask the others, but I'll just..." Heero slid his second sock on, then his feet into his shoes.

"Why does he want us to L-3 earlier?" Duo asked blankly.

"He's going at some point today," Heero explained. "If we aren't there by five, his dad and his uncle will insist he go back with them and he wants to spend the night with me."

"Why is your boyfriend nineteen?" Duo asked blankly.

"He's hardly my boyfriend yet...and if you reverse engineer it, it's because he was born in A.C. one-eight-three."

Duo snorted at that.

"Don't pester," he added after a moment. "You don't say a word against Wufei and half his consorts may not even _be_ legal."

"If you checked Matty's ID," Duo countered, moving from the bathroom with the brush in one hand, "then you'll be damn sure Wufei checks theirs...though you're right, he might not really give a shit."

Heero grinned at that, then moved across the room. It only took him a moment to get to Trowa and Quatre's room, and they both looked up at him blankly.

"Uh...you guys wanna..."

"He messaged us already," Trowa noted. "We don't care."

Heero hesitated, feeling a stirring of excitement before turning and tapping on Wufei's door.

"I'll be packed in a minute," Wufei noted. "Arrange the flight before you or him have a cardiac instance."

Heero laughed at that, darting back to his room.

"Oh, look, he got consensus for us," Duo noted, showing Heero his phone. "It'll take me a few minutes to get my stuff packed up, and according to this, he's already half-way through his flight."

"This?" Heero echoed, distracted from his mission of packing.

"I synced up his itinerary stuff," Duo agreed. "This says his phone is the step down from mine...why doesn't he have it auto-linked? Mine does it when I text more than ten times to a number."

"You pay for that, remember?" Heero retorted, feeling a little defensive. Matty may not have had the most respected job in the world, but it helped him pay rent and bills at his parents' place. He could _hardly_ be blamed for not having the most upfront of technology.

Hell, Duo only had it because he'd get bored and go research something.

"I forgot about that," Duo noted, blinking. "What else do I pay for?"

"I don't look at your bills," Heero retorted, then shook his head. Duo didn't mean anything, there was no point getting all up in arms about his off-hand comments.

'_Okay, I'm going to look up flights now,_' he told the guy. '_We're all ready to be out of here and packed, so it shouldn't take us long._'

'_Yay!_'

Heero grinned slightly and focused on his laptop.

Hopefully they'd all have a good night for this...his would be better, undoubtedly...but maybe hanging out with Matty would put them all in a better mood. Texting him aimlessly all day had worked well enough to begin with...

He'd have to ask his friend what he really thought of that. As far as Heero could tell, it was strange for a couple-night-stand to text aimlessly with all roommates in the house... But if what Duo said was true and he'd _be_ Heero's boyfriend...wasn't it better for him to be friends with the friends?

Might be something interesting to talk about...if they got around to talking.

- -

E/N: hehe, thanks for the review, cewo. Mm, I'm going to try to consistently update this, probalby every other day, probably 2 chapters a time, but I'm not 100% sure on that. I'd appreciate more reviews, I wrote this story without a muse, so I didn't have anyone to bounce ideas off of for it--oh, and I'm already a bit into the sequel. By the time I finish posting this, I should be able to start that one. Hope you all enjoy it. -Kye


	5. Chapter 5

**Five**

"I just can't get used to the smell of it," Matty muttered, bouncing across the room to Duo's bed. "Max was noting to me when we were talking that most people from Earth didn't like the scent of it...and then Fian told me to take a deep breath when I stepped out of the transport...you look tired. Why are you tired?"

The semi-abrupt break of mindless chatter startled Duo from the stupor the flow had put him in to. He blinked a few times at the guy and shrugged. "I drank last night...too much. Woke up puking earlier."

"Oh...that sucks," the kid moved closer to sit on his bed.

They were getting ready to go to the circus. Trowa had gone ahead to get ready for his act—evidently he'd been planning on having one the entire time. Heero had driven the car they'd rented to drop him off. Quatre and Wufei had receded from Matty's pleasant meanderings with the subterfuge of a nap—according to Duo's phone, though, they were both logged into a chatroom.

"Do you do that often?"

Duo met the kid's eyes and shook his head. "You don't want to know my life, huh? Depressing as hell to go back to L-2."

"So why did you?"

"I don't remember, anymore," Duo returned, pulling his shirt off.

"You really work out, don't you?"

"I more impressive than Max?" Duo flashed him a wicked grin.

The guy grinned back at that, laying over sideways where he sat. "All looks good to me...I don't try to judge."

Duo grinned again, reminding himself that this was Heero's toy, not his. As much fun as he might be, it wasn't worth the upset it'd cause the other man.

"But...you do, don't you? You have that gym up there...I thought Max might have been showing off with his forms, but when I woke up Friday, him and Fian were up there doing them."

"They usually do them every morning," Duo agreed. "Nothing showing off about it—don't worry, if Max wants to show off for you, you'll be so impressed you won't realize that's what he was doing. You might not believe it, but he _can_ be subtle."

Matty grinned at that, then jumped slightly. He shifted around slightly to pull his phone out of a pocket, then hit a few buttons...and snorted.

"Hm?" Duo muttered, pulling the newer shirt on and dropping onto the foot of the bed...and laying over sideways so he could look up at the kid's screen.

"Don't read my texts!" Matt protested, yanking the phone away.

"I wasn't reading it," Duo retorted. "Here...you can play with mine if I can play with yours." He offered his phone up.

Matt's grin turned wicked a moment before he hesitantly took the phone from Duo.

"Oh, shit," Duo muttered, taking it back quickly and setting up the touch-sensor. "I almost forgot to set up pax...you gonna set me up on yours?" He passed it back over.

Matty took the phone, blinking at him blankly, then shook his head. "I always heard that was a cool program...it's just _way_ out of my budget."

"Pax?" Duo protested. "You have no clue how worth-it it really is..."

"I think so sometimes," the guy agreed, thinking about it. "But I barely managed to get an As model phone to begin with."

"Oh..." Duo frowned slightly, taking the kid's phone and thinking about it a minute. It only took him a second to access the internet on the thing.

"What are you doing?" Matty muttered blankly. "Don't run up my bill..."

"Oh, I'll pay for it," Duo retorted, keying in his credit-card number on the thing. "I'm getting you pax."

"What?" Matty breathed, lowering the phone to look at him. "Why?"

"Because I can set it up to auto update," Duo flashed him a grin. "We're paranoid like that...all five of us."

"Paranoid about what?" the guy retorted. "Don't...I can't pay you back for that."

"It's my apology for not texting you back like I promised Monday," Duo retorted.

"But..."

"Let me spoil you," Duo argued, starting the download. "Hell, it's not like this will be a stress on my budget—I totally won that appointment I went to. I had the guy half-begging to suck me off before I left."

Matty guffawed at that.

Duo flashed him a grin in response, tossing him the phone. "I'll show you how to set it all up when it's done downloading."

"All...right...you want this back?" he offered Duo's phone.

"I get bored and go research software for that...it's got a bunch of crap on it. We have a good five minutes before He...before Max gets back, you may as well see if there's anything else on there you like."

"But..." he hesitated. "It's kinda weird that you're just buying this for me..."

"Let's get back to the base paranoia I mentioned earlier," Duo suggested with a grin. "There's been some bullshit going on in the area of L-5 your uncle lives...if you gave me the right address. I'd just like a way to keep tabs on you. You can uninstall it when you get back to Earth."

The guy frowned slightly, then looked back at Duo's phone. "Who's Donovan?"

"Ian," Duo returned, looking up toward it. "Wha's he say?"

"It says Donovan invited you into chat...but it won't let me okay it."

"No one but me can okay it," Duo noted with a grin. "Part of the joy of the program. Its part of the request Ian sent."

"You guys chat?"

"Usually when we aren't all home we do it...but evidently all three of them...and Max are." He rolled his eyes, taking the phone. Wufei had a splash screen for entering the thing that consisted of a clip of a naked woman doing...interesting things to herself. Beneath it was a scroll of "Wanna have fun?" It was one of Wufei's random stabs at Quatre's naïveté...though it had long ago lost its ability to make the blond blush.

...but not Matty.

The guy's cheeks flashed bright red as he looked to Duo to see his reaction to the thing.

Duo laughed wickedly. "What? Never looked into the amusements of the female flesh?"

The guy blushed even more, covering his face with his arm.

Duo knew he shouldn't...but that was just cute. He laughed a bit more...and set the clip to play every time the guy touched his phone.

"What did that have to do with anything?" Matty demanded after a moment.

"Jason use to blush like you just did every time something slightly indecent crossed his path...we decided we needed to desensitize him to that...and with that splash screen, we all know it's Wufei's room we're using."

"Wufei?" Matty asked blankly.

Duo stopped short, staring at the guy before grinning. "Sorry...I...I meant Ian."

"That's his real name?"

"Real...name?"

"He said Ian was assumed," Matty reminded. "Do you have a different name, too, Warrick?"

"Yeah, actually," Duo agreed, smirking at him. "But unless you do me some pretty fantabulous favor you ain't gettin' it."

The kid grinned at him.

"The download is done, come on, let's calibrate the program."

"Who in the hell calls it calibrating?"

"The program itself," Duo retorted dryly. "Come on, boot it up."

- -

Matty was amazed to watch Trowa flipping through the air like the trained professional he was. The trapeze was one of Trowa's pastimes, but then again, he did just about everything in one of those shows that didn't include throwing the knives himself.

Hell, he'd probably be fine at that as well.

Heero fully appreciated how highly impressed his little friend was. The fact that the guy was nineteen hadn't more'n passed his mind before they'd met up on the colony, but with his note that his father and uncle would refuse to leave him behind, he had started to be reminded. After they'd met up with his uncle and father briefly and spirited him away, his comfort level had started to come into play.

Heero actually liked how much he chattered. He knew the others found it a bit mind numbing, but not in a way that showed them annoyed. He was grateful for that...but much more looking forward to when they'd all go away.

He grinned more as Matty glanced at him. It was a sidelong look full of pleasure...but Trowa was in mid-swing and living it up. He let go of the bar seemingly too early, which made people gasp as he spun suspended in mid-air, mid-flip...and started to fall. Whoever he was working with, of course, had the timing down to catch him, and even made it look a little freaked out...and the crowd cheered.

Heero caught Trowa glancing their way as Wufei and Duo rolled their eyes. Quatre was grinning in approval, and Matty looked almost like he should have his hands at his mouth. It made Trowa laugh slightly and focus back on what he was doing...which was getting the "are you okay?" body language from the fellow performers.

'Show off,' Duo mouthed.

Heero grinned back at him.

"He almost fell!" Matty muttered, grabbing Heero's arm with both hands and wide eyes. "Did you see that?"

"It's not that far to the ground," Heero returned, meeting his eyes.

Matty stared at him.

He laughed a bit and shook his head. "Sorry...I know...some days when he does this, I wish he didn't."

That was true enough, and phrased appropriately enough, to make it seem like he didn't mean that Trowa's show-offing gave him a big head and made him a bit annoying. Until Matty realized who they were, he wasn't going to understand what they were capable of. The fall would have hurt, Trowa would have been sore for a few days, but his mobility wouldn't have been severely compromised.

Matt grinned at that, leaning against Heero as he looked back to the next spectacle.

Heero assumed it was intriguing to the guy because he knew Trowa...or...

"Have you ever _been_ to a circus?"

"Me?" Matty grinned up at him. "No, why?"

"Ah...I've seen this a thousand times," he gestured at the show in front of them. "If we're around he has us come watch him perform, so we all just sort of roll our eyes at him now...but I can tell you're really enjoying this."

"It is fun," he noted, looking back to the show. "There's no way my dad or my uncle would give a damn."

There it was again...

"They told me that meeting up with you was probably stupid, too...and they've been teasing me about you all texting me," he smiled again. "That's why they were all like that when they saw you guys."

Really, Heero wasn't sure they didn't recognize at least one of them.

"Hey," he muttered, leaning in closer to the guy's ear. "Do they know..."

"That you're fucking me with my full and complete consent?" he asked, his eyes wicked as he met Heero's. He nodded his head. "My dad told me he doesn't particularly care how good you are in bed, I needed to stop talking about...something about my little sister," his snicker was evil.

Heero sat back and gave him a look.

He laughed, then gasped and focused fully on Trowa—who had been swinging around in a swath of cloth and was unrolling from it.

"I think that actually was an accident," Quatre muttered, tilting his head.

"Either that or he's getting damn good at acting," Duo agreed.

"What?" Matty asked blankly, looking back to them.

"Uh...he has really good...body...control," Duo returned obviously picking his words carefully. "Really good..."

"Look, rolling up again," Wufei pointed out, grinning wickedly. "The idiot _did_ fall."

Heero and his friends shared a triumphant smirk. An actual accident on the set would definitely take down the guy's ego trip.

"I dunno," Quatre muttered, thinking about it. "Even if that was, he's going to pretend like he did it on purpose...and we can't tell for sure he didn't just do it for the audience's amusement..."

"...or ours," Duo mused. "With the way he keeps looking over here, I wonder if he's not trying to impress Bobby..."

"His name is Matt," Heero muttered blankly, blinking at the guy.

Duo blinked back at him in confusion.

Matt snickered, giving Duo a look.

"Uh..." Duo looked between Heero and Matt a moment, then met Heero's eyes. "Matty Williams...William...Billy...Billy-Bob...Bob...Bobby," Duo looked around. "I swear it works."

"That works?" Wufei asked blankly.

"How does Donovan even come _close_ to Ian?" Duo retorted.

"Same way War-Rick makes Warrick," Wufei retorted.

"Jason!" Quatre chirped, bouncing in his seat.

Matt started laughing.

"I don't know them," Heero muttered dryly, all but covering his face with a hand. "I really don't..."

"Wire," Duo retorted, looking back to the blond. "Just like Mad-Max, come on..."

"Hey, now," Heero cut him off. "I'm not in this conversation."

"You're all _over_ this conversation like a good lay on the second night."

"Third," Matt retorted.

Duo started laughing.

"Actually, it'd be day," Quatre noted, raising an eyebrow at the kid. "And that means tonight'll be the first night."

Matt smirked back at him.

"Why, Q...Jason," Wufei purred happily.

Matt sighed and ran a hand down his face. Quatre was giving Wufei a look. "Oh, just _give_ me your _names_ already..."

"No, kid," Duo muttered. "I slipped on Wufei...and the rest you don't need."

"Say, what, now?" Wufei asked Duo pointedly. Duo'd managed to forget to mention that to the Chinese man.

"You giving me yours?" Matt's tone was mildly snappish as he looked to Heero.

"Erm..." Heero looked to his friends to see what their thoughts were, then bit his lip and met Matt's eyes. "There's a good reason that we haven't?"

Matt sighed and rolled his eyes. "You know what...I'm watching the show, stop talking to me." He shifted forward and focused on Trowa, who had a female dangling from his legs as they hung from the extremely long swath of pinkish material.

Heero looked to Duo uncertainly.

Duo considered the kid a moment, then shrugged and looked away.

Heero read that as: okay, if you tell him your name, he'll realize who we all are...but if you want to keep him, that'll come up eventually. Your call.

Heero frowned, then ran his hand along the guy's thigh, testing. Matt caught his hand fairly quickly, but didn't shove it away. He wrapped his own had somewhat around it, but didn't look back.

Heero translated that too: yes, I'm annoyed...but yes its okay.

That was a good sign, right?

He hoped so. The idea of Matty with his raven hair and almond-shaped eyes being a one-night stand didn't appeal. There was something about _him_ that Heero rather appreciated...and it went beyond his fairly pale skin and dark-brown eyes...it was _in_ the eyes, though. Maybe it was his trust or how easy going he seemed to be...maybe it was him announcing that he'd been talking to his father about their sex... What Heero actually _figured_, though, was that it was something beyond his own knowledge. That could lead in an insane spiral of confusion and chaos—it had before, ending badly—and he wouldn't be too shocked if...it.... Though, really, unless Duo told him it was bad...he wasn't going to give it up.

...and for some reason, he really _doubted_ that Duo would tell him that any of it was bad.

- -

"I did _not_ fall!" Trowa protested.

"Oh, _sure_ you didn't..." Duo returned dryly. "That's why you had to roll all the way back..."

"You're _supposed_ to!" Trowa gave him an irritated look. "You wouldn't even know! Half the show is tricks and teases...death-defying stunts aren't so amusing when they're entirely death-defying. I had to do three single rolls and I did..."

Quatre smirked slightly, holding his peace.

"Your arms were getting strained," Wufei noted. "When that girl..."

"Angeline was trying to make us start swinging around," Trowa cut him off, then pouted. "To hear you say it, I'm weak and playing games..."

"It's more amusing that way," Quatre noted.

Trowa gave him an amused look.

They all stopped as something caught their attention, then looked around until they realized it was the room over.

"Oh...I forgot he..." Trowa's cheeks flushed very slightly.

"What happened to modesty, really?" Quatre muttered, rolling his eyes.

"How long have they been gone?" Duo asked blankly, glancing at Wufei as he looked to his watch.

"An hour or more," Wufei returned, tilting his head as he glanced at the television. "The last show was an hour one, and this one is almost over...so probably an hour and a half."

"Huh," Duo shook his head, looking back to Quatre and Trowa.

"Turn up the tv, please," Quatre muttered, gesturing his head at it. "I'm glad Heero's having fun, but I'd rather not hear it—and _don't_ make some homophobic joke," he added to Wufei when the other's mouth started to open. "I'd no more want to hear you and one of your little...kitties..."

"Kitties?" Wufei perked up at that, looking around to Duo. "I like that one."

"Yeah," Duo agreed happily. "You know you meet'em all at cat houses."

Trowa, who'd been taking a drink of a can, spat part of it out. It sprayed Quatre, who looked thoroughly offended and disgusted...which made Trowa laugh even harder.

"I give up!" Quatre announced, rising to his feet as he considered his arms and shirt with obvious distaste. "I give up! I'm done! I'm going to bed!"

"He needs some alone time to unwind," Wufei noted to Trowa, making a suggestive gesture with his hand.

Trowa started coughing as he laughed, trying to wipe his mouth off at the same time.

"You _wish_ that bothered me," Quatre retorted from the door. "At least if _I_ went into a cat-house, I _could_ get laid! I don't have to knock them out!"

Wufei started at the blond in stunned silence.

"You stumped him!" Duo crowed as Trowa lay over sideways, laughing heartily. "He's speechless!"

Quatre laughed in a nervous sort of prideful embarrassment, looked back to Wufei, then turned and darted from the room.

"Holy shit, Trowa...he's _speechless!_"

- -

Heero considered the far wall of the little room quietly, thoughtful as Matt snoozed, his head on Heero's shoulder. He was obviously on his way to sleep. Heero wasn't so ready, but he'd gotten lost in thought and was trying to come to a decision.

...but there really was only one option.

"Hey, Matty?" he muttered quietly.

"Hm?"

"You awake?"

"Let's call it that," the guy muttered, snuggling more against his side. "If you really want to..." he sounded drowsy.

"You know earlier?" Heero asked quietly. "You asked about my name?"

"You want to hear me say that instead of Max?" Matt asked, grinning and looking up to Heero a moment.

"It wouldn't hurt anything," Heero retorted. "That's just a side-note, though...you said..."

"I said you were distracting me from the show," he noted somewhat pointedly.

"I know, but..."

"Max?"

Heero hesitated. "Yeah?"

"You said you have a good reason...and so far I haven't seen a reason to ignore your judgment."

"But..."

"But what?" Matt retorted, pressing himself up on his elbow to meet Heero's eyes properly. "Jason was right. This is our first night together...and lord only knows if you'll chase me down again—I understood that bit of Ian's comment about the tramp-stamp." He ran his hand across the bruise that was so near to gone you had to know it was there to see it. "Don't tell me something I don't need to know."

"But what if I want to hunt you down again?" Heero protested, blinking at him.

"Then do it...and you can tell me then."

"I can tell you when I hunt you down?" Heero asked, grinning slightly. "So in a few days when we're all texting you to meet us at the Mi-tai grill you'll have me say?"

"Mi-tai grill?" he echoed blankly.

"It's a place over on twentieth and York," Heero agreed. "I don't know if it's still there...but it was damn good food so it should be."

Matty blinked at him again.

Heero grinned, leaning up to nip his lip, then repeat the gesture more questioningly.

Matty grinned back, and turned the nip into a kiss.

- -

"Shit..." Heero half complained as he yawned again. "Shit shit..."

"Go take a nap," Quatre muttered, gesturing him off. "It's not like we're..."

"But we were going to lunch with the crew," Trowa protested, looking to Quatre with an almost wounded expression.

"They aren't going to realize he's not there, are they?" Quatre asked blankly.

"Cathy will," Trowa frowned at him.

"Will she understand that the only reason he woke up this morning was because his lover's daddy was calling to check up on him?"

Heero started laughing, rubbing at his eyes.

"I can't believe he actually called," Duo noted in amusement, looking back to the group. "I half expected you to answer..."

"I tried to," Heero noted dryly. "For some reason his phone has pax on it now and he didn't remember to put me in his list before bed." He gave Duo a pointed look. "And then when they were done talking and he tried to, he couldn't figure the program out."

"I didn't show him how to do that," Duo noted, frowning as he thought. "I meant to."

Heero rolled his eyes...and yawned again.

"Well...can you take a nap?" Trowa asked, understanding that Heero was tired, but not relenting on their lunch date.

"Trowa, his dad called at six this morning, and his flight left at seven. When I got back you were all up and dragged me down to breakfast...I _need_ sleep."

"You can get up by noon, right?"

Heero sighed, rising to his feet and moving across the room.

"Heero?"

Heero sighed again, leaning against the doorjamb to look at the European man. "Wake me up and ask me, okay?"

"I don't want to..." Trowa started, obviously at a loss. "I know...but..."

"Just wake me up," Heero returned, starting from the room. "I should be fine...wake me up at eleven-thirty."

Trowa nodded, looking down.

Heero moved from the room and closed the door.

"You're a needy little bitch some days," Quatre muttered, looking away.

Wufei's jaw dropped.

Duo started sniggering.

Trowa blinked at Quatre blankly.

"Just sayin'..." Quatre shrugged innocently and stood up. "I'm gonna run down to the store. Anyone want anything?"

"Yeah, give me some of what you're taking," Duo returned easily, bouncing slightly. "Hey, I'll come with," he bounced up and grinned at the stunned pair...and followed the blond into the hall.


	6. Chapter 6

**Six**

Duo was glad that Matty had come and helped them all out of the slump that L-2 had sunk him into. The idea of not going to L-5 had some major appeal to it, but that would keep Heero from seeing the little shit again.

It made things complicated.

The idea of making Wufei go to L-5 had some merit, helping him deal with his inner demons, helping him cope with the losses he'd been ignoring...but there seemed to a ton more demerits for it...

Matty, though, wasn't that strong in the self-confidence vein. If he thought Heero might be trying to lose him, he'd disappear on them all to make it easier for them.

He couldn't fully do that with pax on his phone, but he'd definitely try.

So they sort of had to go.

Maybe Wufei would be okay with that? Maybe Wufei would let the boy stand more important?

Duo snorted slightly, staring out the window.

"You about ready to go?" Wufei muttered, moving into their room.

"Huh?" Duo looked back to him blankly.

"The show?" Wufei gestured over his shoulder as he studied Duo with interest. "You ready?"

"Oh...yeah, right," Duo shook himself from his stupor and moved across the room, grabbing his wallet from on top of his bed and tucking it away.

They had the night, then more than half the next day. Quatre's older sister was already starting to call to make sure everything was ready. They'd be leaving from a medium priced hotel room to a multi-level mansion. That usually ended up being amusing, but there was also the whole thing where the Winner heir was escorted from the port in a fleet of bulletproof SUVs that had anti-tank armor and such things.

It made it a little more complicated for Jason Wire to head home, but they never planned what they were doing ahead of time, so it was pretty simple for them to randomly dart out of the mansion without the family's precautions. It drove Adala nuts, and she'd strove to keep them in at first...but hopefully this time she'd get that it wasn't happening.

The show went about the same as the first night. Trowa awed the crowd with his perfect skills. His blunders of the first performance weren't even hinted at in the second night's show, and for the ones who'd seen the first night, they were impressed. It lasted just as long with the woman managing to get them into a spin for the cloth thing...and then it was over again.

"I don't want to sleep alone," Heero noted, moving up behind Duo.

Duo turned to raise an eyebrow at him. He understood the comment, and Heero knew he did. That hadn't been a random note. That had been an offer.

"I do," Wufei noted happily, bouncing a little as Trowa said his good night to the Angeline girl. "Unless she's coming back with us."

"Careful, Chang," Quatre muttered sidelong. "I'm pretty sure she's jailbait for another six months."

"Count the time in-womb and she's not," Wufei retorted, smirking slightly. The girl was in her show top, but had thrown on a pair of lounge-pants.

"Ah, but the legal system of L-3, which I'd call," Quatre went on smoothly, "probably wouldn't consider that grounds for statutory rape."

Wufei turned to focus on Quatre with a pout.

"You can try to let the argument fly, but Heero's got the single room and I don't think Duo's game for a threesome with a minor."

Duo grinned wickedly back at the blond.

"Why do you have it out for me?" Wufei protested. "The last few days..."

Heero blinked at the pair in confusion.

"You've been missing all the fun," Duo informed Heero happily as Cathy followed Trowa toward the group. "Quatre's getting in digs left and right."

"You okay?" Heero asked Quatre, studying his face. "You've seemed a little out of it lately."

"It's just stress," Quatre admitted, deflating and gesturing apologetically to Wufei. "Going to L-4 will be all right...but all the details involved...Adala is insane. She can't trust that the five of us can keep _me_ alive. The notion that we _saved the world_ seems to fly over her head. _Sure_...we spent however many months running around Earth alone, in pairs, or all together when it was a _war zone_ and I didn't get wounded...much...but making it from the _port_ to the _mansion_ is _**too**_ far..."

"You gonna be all right?" Heero pressed, studying him. "You need to get laid or something?"

That got Heero the _levelest_ of looks.

Heero grinned at him.

"It does help with the stress, better than the one-hand workout," Duo spoke up helpfully. "Could do you wonders."

"If I'm going to get laid," Quatre noted very pointedly, looking at the three of them pointedly, "I'm sure as hell _not_ letting you three set up the circumstance...Trowa, maybe, if he's being sober...but you three'd get me in over my head."

"I didn't say anything!" Wufei protested, and though his broad grin would have put off a passer-by, the group of them knew better. Wufei may possibly have been hurt by the repeated attacks, but it was more likely that he didn't know how to react. He wasn't sure why Quatre was ribbing him...and he wasn't sure if it was cause to be upset or not.

"Sorry," Quatre muttered, meeting his eyes. "You just usually take digs at me, so when I see them coming I...I'm sorry."

"What's up?" Trowa asked, moving to drape his arm around Cathy as they joined the group. "Anyone against having a lady join us?"

"All five of us?" Quatre asked skeptically.

There was a mass amount of amazement in the group of friends as they stared at Quatre...though Duo's silence only lasted a third of a second before he died laughing. Wufei had smacked a hand to his face...and Heero stared at the blond in stunned amazement. For her part, Catherine took it like a champ. She was staring at Quatre in amused disbelief while Trowa was giving him a look like he'd grown a second head.

Quatre sniggered, covering his mouth with his hands. "I'm _so_ sorry, Cathy! I _totally_ didn't mean to _say_ that!"

She started giggling hard, covering her face.

"You really have lost your mind, haven't you?" Trowa asked Quatre in blank disbelief. "You really...you've lost it."

Quatre's snickers turned into wicked laughter.

"Let's...get going back to the hotel," Heero suggested tactfully. "I have a feeling some of us are going to need a drink."

- -

With a much lighter mood and a bit better sleep, the group had boarded the shuttle bound for L-4. Going to the mansion was always the highlight of their trips, and the idea of going on to L-5 was usually the one that brought them all down. At the very least it brought Wufei down.

Wufei was glad he was sitting point for the group. His musings had waxed depressive. Generally, the day before they left to L-5, the others would all agree that they didn't really need to go. They'd arrange with Adala, who was the family spokesperson, for them to stay the remainder of their trip in the mansion. It was bad enough to Wufei that you could see the L-5 cluster on your way to Earth—or was that his imagination?

Hard to tell.

He glared out at the stars twinkling in the distance.

There were two reasons he wasn't going to get out of going to L-5 this trip. One of them that figured fairly prominently was a raven-haired nineteen-year-old. Snaking out of that end of the trip now would deprive Heero of seeing the kid again, and no matter how he tried to explain it to the...uh...napping male, he checked his phone to make sure...the kid would probably assume it was some form of mutual avoidance. The second reason was that Trowa had decided he needed to go back. Trowa'd thought the same for a long time. Wufei wasn't ever able to figure out why, but Trowa was sincere...and very good at redirecting Wufei.

So they would go back to L-5 for the first time since the second war. ...the war where he'd been so stupid. He'd clung to his logic at the time, insisting that they had to check the peace they'd made...and desperately trying to ignore the empty feeling that had sunk into him after the end of the first war.

How long had he even tried to live? One month? Two?

There was a reason he'd stopped thinking about all of that. There was a reason he'd redirected his own focus. It made him squirm internally and...it was a dark place. It was so much easier to laugh than think about the stupid mistakes he'd made.

He focused on Heero, who was sleeping beside him, and spread out how he was sitting slightly. Heero'd been giving them both equal room, and at the feeling, pulled his leg back slightly. Wufei adjusted himself out a little more...and a little more...until Heero finally woke up.

He snickered and straightened.

"I'm going to beat you," Heero muttered tiredly, relaxing his leg so it rested against Wufei's.

Wufei shifted himself back into his own space, looking beyond Heero at Quatre, who had the dazed expression of someone who wasn't quite awake and wasn't sure why. Beyond him, Duo and Trowa were curled up in their seats, sleeping fairly soundly.

The Chinese man tried to control his sigh, but not nearly hard enough, considering the amount of air that did escape his nose.

"What?" Heero asked tiredly.

"I didn't say anything," Wufei retorted, knowing how childish it was and not caring.

"Uh-huh...tell me anyway."

"Want me to make something up?"

"Why did you wake me up?" Heero returned.

"I was just..."

"Wufei."

Wufei sighed, feeling that heavy pull again and shaking his head, looking out the window. He wasn't sure what to say, but one thing he liked about Heero was that he could wait to hear it.

"I don't...want...to go to L-5," he decided finally.

"You never do...but I'd like to go."

"I know...and Trowa feels the need for me to go."

"You should see the memorial," Heero noted. "Convince yourself it'd be a dishonor not to, and it'll be easier."

"You only want to go so we can meet up with Matty," Wufei retorted.

"And you'd have said we weren't going by now if you didn't want to meet up with him, too," Heero yawned. It was a longer one, but when Wufei glanced at him, he had his eyes open. "Listen...I know it's not easy. I know I probably don't understand more than half of it, but I also know...you can do this."

"It's a want," Wufei retorted. "As in me not _wanting_ to."

"Don't be bitchy," Heero retorted easily. "Come on, Wufei...if we don't meet up with him, his dad will probably spout something off about it figuring...and who knows how it'll make him feel. We've been talking to him constantly this whole trip...and you just want to drop to Earth without going to the place he is?"

Wufei sighed, looking back out the window. "It's hard, Heero."

Heero rested a reassuring hand on Wufei's thigh, and after the moment where Wufei almost threw him off, he sighed again and relaxed.

"What's the matter?" Quatre asked tiredly.

"He's getting anxious about L-5," Heero returned.

"Oh...you okay, Fei?"

"I'll be all right," Wufei reassured him. "I just had to distract myself."

"Oh...here..." Quatre shifted out of the ball he'd been curled in and dug into his carry-on. After a moment, he came out with a puzzle book and pen. "Will that help?"

"Maybe," Wufei returned dubiously, opening it to the page the pen was clipped to and looking at the blank. It was like a crossword box, but instead of questions...it was words. Wufei blinked at it, then noted the label was 'fill-it-in.'

Quatre zipped up his bag and curled back up, yawning. "I'm _not_ looking forward to dealing with Adala's security."

"It's all good, Jase," Heero half-purred at him.

Quatre made an amused noise and settled back down.

Heero waited a moment longer, making sure Wufei was actually focusing on the book—he didn't want to get woken up again—then settled back down himself.

Wufei considered the one word that had been filled into the puzzle, noting that it'd been marked off in the list, too...then took in the rest of the board.

So you were supposed to make all the words fit.

That could be...entertaining.

He clicked the pen out...and started trying to figure out the details.

- -

"Ten cars," Wufei noted, considering the fleet of SUVs. "That's a fifty-fifty chance of getting one of us."

"You're so reassuring," Quatre retorted, not appreciating the protective stance his friends had taken around him. He knew deep down that if they didn't do it, the security team would, but that didn't make him like it any more.

"I appreciate those odds," Wufei muttered on, grinning wickedly.

"Kinda like you appreciated my fill-it-in?" Quatre demanded.

"I didn't realize you were using them sparingly," Wufei protested, looking around to him. "You gave them to me to distract me...it worked."

"I just don't have anymore puzzles," Quatre agreed dryly.

Wufei grinned at him. "I'll try to find you another one."

"They sell them at the grocery store," Quatre retorted. "That was supposed to be the hardest type, by the way."

"Were they hard for you?"

"No, they were puzzles to pass time with," Quatre snapped.

"Wow," Trowa muttered, looking over to Heero. "Psycho boys be upset."

"Your grammar in that sentence pains me, and your choice of descriptive really needs re-thought," Quatre noted pointedly to him.

"Leave him alone, guys," Duo spoke up. "Look at this shit," he gestured at the cars. Their luggage was being loaded for them, but they weren't being allowed to get into the vehicles...even though there were privacy screens up around the full set of cars. "Don't pick at him when _this_ is how his sister makes him come home."

Trowa hushed.

"Ready, Mr...Wire?" the lead driver asked curiously, moving back over to them.

"Yeah, but just to shake it up," Heero spoke up, bouncing slightly, "we're all going in one car."

The man blinked at him a moment, then started to negate.

"Let's go, now," Quatre cut that off before he could. "Adala should know by now that I can take care of my own, and this silliness," he gestured at the fleet, "is a waste of money that could be put to use elsewhere."

The guy hesitated a moment, then met Quatre's eyes. "Would it help you to know that only one vehicle is owned by the Winner family? That the rest were rented?"

"Not particularly," Quatre returned. "If we happen to come under attack," he moved forward, "my friends and I wouldn't have a problem defending ourselves."

They exchanged a minor glance. If they had _weapons_ they'd be able to defend themselves, but they didn't really carry that stuff openly through checkpoints or in their checked bags. Actually, the weapons Heero'd brought were _in_ his bag. He never had gotten the impression that L-4 was all that dangerous, though, despite Adala's paranoia.

"Get in," Quatre added to the group.

Duo knew better than to argue, and Trowa thought it was funny enough not to. Wufei hesitated a moment, but Heero wasn't even going to get into it as the lead-man spluttered. The guy's first instinct was to get the Winner heir tucked safe away in a dark little corner with a snuggly blanket and the reassurance that nothing would happen...Quatre's first instinct was to piss everyone else off and go into the house swinging.

The two didn't precisely coincide.

"Let's go," Quatre noted, moving into the van as well and sliding the door closed.

Really...he felt a bit better for that minor display of petulance...but only a bit.

- -

"You drive me mad," Adala informed Quatre as they moved into the foyer. She moved forward without hesitance, though, and hugged him. She also kissed his forehead. "Peter called and told me your nonsense."

"Tattle-tale," Quatre reprimanded passingly to the man as he moved up behind. The guy looked like he expected more to come, but Quatre wasn't feeling particularly snippy now that he was faced with his golden-haired sisters. Belour, Fasiha, and Iraida. He kissed them all in turn as Adala moved on to greet the rest of the company.

"Thank you, Peter," Adala added, moving to shake his hand. "I think we'll be fine until Quatre decides to randomly run off...and if you could manage it..."

"If you tell him to follow me, he'll never see me again this trip," Quatre noted pointedly.

Adala gave him an irritated look as Belour giggled. She was barely a year older than the group of them.

"What are you giggling at?" Quatre demanded of her, though it was affectionate.

"You're such an ass," she retorted. "Poor Addy's been worrying herself sick about you getting from the port to here without anyone seeing you and now you're..."

"If my cover is blown, my cover is blown," Quatre noted pointedly—though there was something in that note that made him feel massively better. With the way Adala had been ranting and raving about security, his first thoughts had been militant.

...but then again, his family was supposed to be pacifistic.

Kinda made him an ass, didn't it?

He grinned at his sisters.

"We can take our bags up to our own room, before you get some porter on it," Quatre noted as Peter started turning around.

"I'll just get them to bring..." the man started.

"Its fine," Heero reassured him with Wufei on his heels. "We can get them."

"I'll just..." Peter was quickly following after them out the doors. "The car..."

Heero knew the man didn't think they could tell one black vehicle from the other, but Heero had languidly made an attack plan, which required the machine his weapons were in. He tapped the side of the thing as Peter stopped and looked around blankly...and the trunk was popped.

"If you're here, you may as well take this one in," Wufei added, passing the man a bag. "We can get the rest."

"Uh...all...right," Peter returned blankly. "If you're sure..."

Wufei gestured him away, then smirked slightly at Heero as the driver of that particular machine grinned back at them.

Evidently, he was a man after their own heart.

- -

'_So where are you?_'

'_L-4,_' Heero repeated. '_Ask again and see if the answer changes._'

'_WHICH L-4?_' Matty demanded.

'_The one you're not at! Haha!_' Heero grinned slightly.

'_I'm not IN the cluster...you're an ass._'

'_I luv u?_' Heero offered, grinning more.

'_Not if you can't even type it out right,_' Matty retorted.

'_Oh...sorry, my bad._'

'_My bad?_' the guy echoed. '_You ARE an ass._'

Heero snickered.

'_Tell me...which L-4 are you on?_'

'_You can't come visit here,_' Heero noted. '_It'd be an imposition on our host._'

'_Why does it matter? How is it an imposition?_'

Heero definitely read some sullenness in the question.

'_We're at a house,_' he explained. '_And it's not a set-up where I can just have someone come over._'

"What?" Duo muttered. They were in the sitting room of Quatre's suite. They had small bedrooms across the hall, but that sitting room would serve as their living room for the time they'd be there.

"He wants to come," Heero explained, frowning as he waited for more word.

"You told him there's no way he could?" Duo returned. He was reading a newspaper.

"I did, and tried not to be an ass...but he's insisting I'm an ass."

"Huh," Duo lowered the paper a moment. "I'll talk to him after a bit and see if I can smooth it over."

"Thank you," Heero muttered gratefully. He wasn't sure how to move around the sullenness. He focused back on his phone. '_Don't be upset with me..._'

'_I'm just not liking the sudden stabs of lies you throw at me._'

'_Lies?_' Heero protested.

'_Yeah,_' he agreed. '_You know...YOUR NAME._'

'_I was GOING to tell you!_'

A minute passed, then two. Heero shifted slightly, trying to work out how the emotions would play out. He had a feeling this was all his bad, and he...he was going to have to ask Duo.

He sighed...and tossed his phone at the guy. "Help."

Duo, who'd jumped as the phone hit his paper, lowered it to look at Heero a moment, then picked up the phone. He clicked into the memory and read back through the messages. He read them again, considerately, then looked up at Heero.

"Well?" Heero asked, shifting forward with his elbows on his knees. "Where'd I fuck up?"

"It's the situation, not you," Duo retorted, looking back down. "Here, he's admitted it," he tossed it back.

'_Sorry...this is just a new situation for me. I don't know if I should be offended about you not telling me or not...I'm not trying to be pissy at you. I know you were going to say._'

'_I won't say it over the phone, either,_' Heero added. '_And especially not from where we are. There's too much unrest out here. I don't have the programs I need to ensure the phones are protected._'

'_We BOTH have pax! War paid for it for me! Or does it not work now?_'

'_No, it's a one pay,_' Heero reassured him. '_That's not...pax can be hacked._'

'_Who would HACK it?_'

'_My enemies?_' Heero sighed slightly. '_That group of psychos on 27? The damn military for all I know._'

'_Why do you have enemies? Why would any of them care? Who ARE you?_'

'_I said...not here,_' Heero returned. He was relatively sure they weren't being hacked, but he didn't want to fully jeopardize the information that way.

'_Then when?_'

'_We're here all tomorrow,_' Heero returned. '_Then until three the next day. We have to settle into our hotel, but I'll let you know which one it is so we can meet...have dinner? Just me and you?_'

'_At that place you said?_'

'_Yeah...it's a good place...but we can go better if you want. Look around, find something interesting. Anything you want, huh?_'

"You look dreamy," Duo noted, glancing up at him again. "You make it right?"

"Better," Heero returned with a nod. "He's stopped being upset now."

"Good job."

Heero flashed him a return grin.

'_But...what do we do now? I really wanted to come over tonight._'

'_I really want you over tonight,_' Heero retorted. '_Unfortunately, life doesn't always cooperate with the stirrings of lust._'

'_You said you loved me._'

Heero considered that a moment in mild alarm...then realized it was probably a tease. He bit his lip slightly. '_I said I luved you,_' he retorted.

'_You just can't type English, can you? How about Japanese? You said you're Japanese, right?_'

Heero snickered at that and switched the language over. '_I can misspell it here, too._'

'_*giggles*_'

'_You GIGGLE?_' Heero protested, switching it back to English. '_I want to hear you giggle..._'

Duo, who'd been watching the mild play of emotions across Heero's face, rolled his eyes and focused back on the paper. He'd been having a conversation with the nineteen year old, but the guy had slowed down in his messaging enough to note a distraction. With Heero going through so many emotions in such a short period of time, it explained that distraction.

Duo kinda wished the others would hurry up and come back. It'd be better in the group for Heero to ignore his companions. It'd be a lot less boring.

Heero smirked at the screen.

Duo raised his paper back up, wishing it could be a pointed gesture. He knew what he'd say if Heero asked him 'what?', too: All the better to ignore you with, my dear.

- -

The L-4 visit went how things usually went. It started with Quatre being some form of pissy about the security measures, then bled into him feeling caged in. That, in turn, led the pilots to sneaking out of the house to go find somewhere to play. Once that urge had been satisfied, usually at a pub, they'd sneak back into the house and Adala would throw a fit at Quatre. Quatre would bicker with the woman happily for a while before their supper was announced, and the group of them would make their way down to eat it.

That was the first night.

The second day would have them waking up at various times, and if it was around noon, they'd immediately go for food. It was ten, though, and they were all quite happy to shower and meet in the great room off of Quatre's bedroom.

"He really wants to come," Heero noted in summation to Duo. "He keeps trying to get me to tell him which L-4 this is...I think so he can show up and impose on our host and have it not be our fault."

"That'd actually work, and kill a couple birds with one stone," Quatre noted, grinning at him.

"We're not at war," Heero retorted almost tartly. "If I'm killing a bird, it's to eat...and it'd be chicken...and I don't really _like_ chicken."

Quatre sniggered.

"Permission denied," Trowa quipped happily.

"Actually, I just told him to do it," Quatre retorted, meeting his eyes.

"No! I'm denying it!" Trowa grinned wickedly.

"You can't deny it if no one else is," Quatre protested. "That'd be pointless. As soon as he realizes who one of us are, he should reason out the rest."

"Question being, how will he figure that one out? It's not like we're poster heroes for the wars."

"Ah, but they made a foot-note about us in history," Quatre measured a half an inch in front of him. "Our names are there, and most reasonable people have heard them."

"Considering the addition of _Barton_ to my name," Trowa retorted, "and the whole _Barton_ revolution...I'd rather _not_ have it bandied about by some piece of ass."

"Literally," Wufei noted to Duo, snickering slightly.

"He's not just a piece of ass," Heero protested, frowning at the other.

"So what?" Trowa snapped. "You're gonna keep him? Bring him around and love him? Let him be your little boyfriend, cute and cuddly in your bed? There are a _few_ problems with that, I'm sure you've gathered."

"Like _what?_" Duo demanded darkly.

"When does he _ever_ keep anyone?" Trowa's ire flared as he focused on Duo. "He uses them and tosses them aside when he's bored with them...and shit, Do...the kid is nineteen..._nineteen!_"

"It's not like he's illegal," Heero protested, obviously thinking about that one.

"He may as well be," Trowa snapped back, glaring between the two before looking around to see that Quatre's face was impassive. He was glaring at Trowa with hard eyes.

"But...he's been legal for a year," Heero muttered blankly.

"Obviously he doesn't get your point," Duo said, tone still dark. "Honestly, I don't either. What's your problem, Trowa?"

Trowa bristled. "He doesn't even know how to _be_ in a relationship!"

"Then why is Matty _still_ coming around?" Duo's voice may as well have been a yell. He didn't look it, but they could tell he was severely pissed.

Quatre shifted back slightly as Heero blinked between Duo and Trowa. Wufei sat back himself, deciding that though he could announce homophobia with the intent of getting a good laugh, the likelihood of it panning out was nearly null.

"Tell me, Barton," Duo added, glowering at the man. "You've had a problem with Matty ever since he showed up...but you still texted with him like the rest of us. He told me all sorts of shit on the others," he gestured to the group with his head, "and his notes on you weren't any different than on them...and you were showing off for him at the circus...so why is it an issue for Heero to keep him? You want him instead?"

Trowa'd been getting more and more irritated with the speech, but that final question made him shift back slightly and blink. He started to shake his head, then looked around to see what the others thought.

"Ooh, you can't tell me the boy's not cute," Wufei noted, bouncing slightly where he sat.

"That's not it," Trowa snapped, looking away. "That's not even..."

"You're straight?" Duo asked sweetly. "That's the problem, isn't it? He brings out the flirt in you and you know he's not a chick...kinda messes with your head, doesn't it? Easier for him _not_ to be around at all."

Trowa was staring at him with disbelief on his face.

Duo smirked and flicked his head so the braid swayed like a snake. He met Heero's eyes. "I'm not quite ready for him to know me yet...maybe just go get a motel room for the night and come back after you drop him off in the morning."

Heero perked up at that, then smiled at them all. "I'll be back."


	7. Chapter 7

**Seven**

"Did you know that the actual Winners live here?"

"As opposed to the actual losers?" Heero asked blankly, grinning slightly to himself.

"No! Winner...like...Winner Industries?" Matty turned and crawled back on the bed to straddle the other male. "Like...disgustingly rich family? The heir almost got disowned for going to war?"

Heero lowered his arm, which had been covering his eyes, to look at the guy.

"I always thought that was messed up," Matty added quietly, looking to the ceiling thoughtfully. "I mean...he did it to save the colonies or something, right?"

"Yeah," Heero agreed quietly. "To free them from tyranny."

"Alliance," Matty added, snorting slightly. "I never did understand what was going on, you know?" he added, looking back down to Heero. "I was...eleven or twelve...when it all started."

_Oh, when I came went to Earth to destroy the Alliance?_ Heero wondered if he'd learned that sarcasm from Duo or Wufei.

"It was kinda scary," Matty added quietly. "Me and my mom were in China visiting some of her family." He looked back toward the window. "And I remember my mom being scared..." his face became sad.

"Where is your mom?" Heero muttered quietly. He heard quite a lot about Matt's dad...but never a word on the woman.

"She died," he said quietly, looking down to his chest. "She..."

Heero's mouth went dry. "Please don't say Edwards," he whispered.

"Edwards?" Matty echoed, meeting his eyes. "New Edwards? No," he shook his head. "The New Edwards shit was the fault of the Gundams...she was in a building that had some notable jackass that the Alliance wanted dead. She...died instantly," he added, meeting Heero's eyes. "Some bomb went off and she was just...one of the casualties," he looked away mournfully a moment, then shook his head and perked back up. "No...no...the...one of the Gundams killed the fucker responsible for it. I call it divine justice."

Divine?

"Divine?" Heero asked, not sure how to pursue that one anyway.

"Well," the kid grinned slightly at him. "I don't know how he heard it...but my friend likes to say the pilot of the one...um...zero-two?" he was obviously thinking about it. "He said that he knew someone who knew someone..." he grinned, "who said that the pilot of zero-two called himself the god of death."

Heero ran a hand through his hair, wondering what Duo would think about that. It seemed fitting that Matty got along as well as he did with Duo in that light. Duo'd gotten his revenge for him...but he didn't know that.

Matty smiled slightly, then licked his lips. "Listen to me? Ranting about the wars like I have any idea what was happening," he sighed and slid off Heero. "I don't even know what side you supported and I could have just offended you to your core without realizing it...my dad tells me I talk too much without thinking and I never see his point...but shit."

Heero made an amused noise. "I was on the winning side."

"Winning?" Matty repeated. "What do you mean?"

"Who won in the end?" Heero repeated in a bit more amusement, thinking back to how terrified normal soldiers were when they knew him.

"...earth?"

Heero grinned a bit more.

"But that doesn't work...you said you were colony born..." the guy was obviously thinking about it.

"Just leave it at the winners," Heero reassured him. "Speaking of...what were you saying about the Winner family?"

"What? Uh...Oh!" Matty sat up again happily. "I was trying to see if I could see their mansion from here."

"It's up the edge," Heero noted, pointing out the window to his left...the window Matt had been staring out of originally. "You can see the lights of it from there," he pointed at the end of the window-line. He'd made sure he had a clear visual of at least some of the mansion. If something came up, the others would use a light—a laser pointer, actually—to let him know.

"Really?" Matty hopped up and moved back toward the window. "Which one?"

Heero grinned and rose himself, moving to look out as well. He ducked down slightly to have Matty's sight-level, then pointed out at the mansion lights.

"That's wicked...we're close," Matty breathed, staring at those lights. "You know...wouldn't it be cool if he were there? The heir? I heard he's like...your age," Matty tilted his head to the side, obviously thinking.

"What good would it do us if he was there?" Heero retorted, nipping at the guy's ear. "I mean, it's not like we could waltz into the foyer and be all, 'Hey, Mr. Winner...I wanted to meet you...'"

Matty snickered at that and turned to smack his stomach. "That's beside the point!"

"Ooh, I know," Heero muttered, pushing him back toward the bed. "Hey, Mr. Winner! Come take a picture with me! Your lips have that cute bow going on and I just wanna bite'em!" he nipped at Matty's lip.

The younger male actually giggled at that, pushing him back some.

"No?" Heero pouted at him. "Maybe...ooh, maybe," he leaned down to the guy's ear as he lowered his voice. "Maybe tell him he's on the bed already and boxers come off damn fast..."

Matty laughed wickedly at that. "I'd like to hear you say that to Mr. Winner...I'd like to see what he'd say to that with you in the foyer."

Heero laughed wickedly and bit at Matty's ear. "Maybe we should just do it, then...get the thought out of my head before I make an ass of myself."

Matty snickered some more...but didn't seem to have anything else to add. Heero had a feeling that had something to do with the spot on his throat he was running his tongue over...but it didn't really matter. There wasn't really anything left to say.

- -

Quatre yawned as Heero pulled into the driveway. He'd texted so they knew he was dropping Matty off, and then he'd be back. Quatre had been down in the kitchen when he realized the time, and had decided he may as well wait in greeting.

Heero was bright-eyed as he moved toward the front doors...and he nearly started skipping as he noticed Quatre in the door.

"Good night?" Quatre demanded dryly.

"Very," Heero agreed, still grinning widely...but he was moving fast.

Quatre started to pull away, realizing that Heero was heading for him, then chirped in irritation as he was slammed against the wall.

"Hey, Mr. Winner," Heero whispered in his ear in a husky voice. "You're on the bed already...and boxers come off _damn_ fast."

Quatre chirped more, trying to shove the guy away. He didn't know what the _hell_ Heero was thinking, but he'd heard tale of Heero getting straight guys into bed and wasn't even remotely curious about the process.

Heero started laughing darkly, pushing him against the wall again and leaning back in. "Your protests don't seem nearly as uh...vicious...as I thought they'd be, Mr. Winner..."

Quatre knew he was blushing at that and stopped fighting entirely, meeting Heero's eyes again.

Heero grinned, studying his eyes and looking down to his lips considerately, then met his eyes again. "Well...if you ever actually get curious...rare is the night you don't know where I sleep."

Quatre bristled at that and started hitting him as well as he could. The severely close quarters didn't limit Heero, but Quatre was only given as much room as was between their bodies...but he'd go for the balls if...

Heero snickered and...used a foot on the wall by Quatre's knee to flip away backwards. The heir realized at that same moment that he'd launched his attack for the other's groin. The annoying pilot landed in a squat, facing the blond. He looked for all the world like everything had gone according to his plan...

"What the hell was that!?" Quatre demanded, pushing away from the wall and gesturing vaguely. "What the fuck are you doing?!"

"I was just teasing!" Heero protested, rising smoothly. "Matty was all on last night about the Winner heir," he rolled his eyes. "Wanted to see if he could see the mansion and everything...was saying he wanted to meet you and shit."

Quatre gave him a level look, noting the jealousy Heero himself may not have even noticed.

"I pointed out that he couldn't just come in here and say anything...and suggested a couple things he could say."

"That I was on the bed already?" Quatre demanded dryly.

The wicked grin flashed again. "Well...he pointed out to me that it wouldn't work in the foyer...and you were waiting for me...I couldn't help it."

Quatre crossed his arms.

"Oh, calm down," he pursued, moving around in a way that put his own back to the wall. It helped Quatre keep from bristling more. "I didn't mean anything by it...and I always tease you..." he started herding him for the stairs.

"You're an unmitigated ass, Heero Yuy," Quatre informed him, not uncrossing his arms. He did start walking, though. "I'd be well within my rights to hurt you."

"I wanted you to," Heero noted happily, then squawked and dodged the fist that barely cleared his head—would have been straight-on if he hadn't ducked.

"What's the matter? You wanted me to!" Quatre swung again.

Heero decided that they needed to take the argument to the bedroom, darting under the blonde's arms and heading up the stairs.

He doubted Quatre would be able to land one of those blows...but it might be awkward to explain to his sisters why he'd actually come-on to their brother when they all knew he was straight.

It just seemed like one of those conversations that wasn't really worth having.

- -

There were some things that just didn't pan out in explanation. The whole, 'you had to be there' idea would run far too true—and Heero managed to hit into the core of one of them.

Duo was amused, though, to watch as Heero tried to make a mends for his stunt. It had been decently early in the morning when Heero had gotten back, and it was well after noon before Quatre had relented his petulant annoyance at all. Duo could see embarrassment in Quatre. The blond hadn't even looked at Heero for most of the time of them not talking, and even after starting to talk to Heero he was hard pressed to meet eyes. Behind the embarrassment was uncertainty, but Quatre's sister Belour had shown up for her time with little-brother. Heero was having to make his overtures in a subtle fashion that Duo wondered if Quatre even recognized.

"But I do want you to meet him," Belour added in summation. She'd been telling Quatre about some beau she had. "I...invited him over tonight after supper," she added, looking around to all of them.

"Do we get to test him?" Quatre asked with a slightly raised eyebrow.

Belour gave him a look.

"I just want to know that if I talk to him and decide he's an asshole and chase him off, you're not going to be upset with me."

"Don't be like that," Belour retorted, smacking at him. "I value your opinion, but unless all five of you tell me he's no good with a perfectly straight face, I'm not going to believe it. And unless you can keep a civil tongue in your head I won't take you seriously."

Quatre smirked at her. "Madam, I am the very _soul_ of civil conversation."

She smacked him.

He snickered, then looked around and gestured at Trowa. "I told you, get with him. I know he's dependable and you like him well enough...he can flatter you and get you flowers and all that silly shit to get you to fall for him...right, Tro?"

Trowa was giving Quatre a mildly disbelieving look.

"And if you don't like the common look, take the exotic," he gestured at Wufei.

Belour's cheeks had colored as she looked directly back at Wufei, but then the look was turned to Quatre.

"Oh, right...I've told you about him...uh...Heero's got someone...Duo's free," he indicated the other pilot.

Duo sat forward, knowing his smirk was wicked. "For all the world, Madam, I'd love to take you home tonight."

"I _am_ home," she retorted, though she was smiling.

"That much easier," Duo returned, wondering what he'd have to say to get Quatre to react. "Lose the stiff and me'n you can go wander up the hall."

"You aren't going to say _any_thing to him?" Belour demanded of Quatre. She was far from offended, and only embarrassed to the point of knowing Duo'd probably take her down the hall, but wouldn't pursue.

"I just told you to get with him," Quatre noted almost uncertainly. "Wouldn't that defeat my purpose?"

Duo started laughing at that, hoping Quatre's new extension of humor would last beyond the trip. He loved the jackass quality the guy had decided to own.

"Quatre Raberba Winner!" Belour sat up straight as her cheeks genuinely flushed. "How could you say something like that to me!"

"I just open my mouth and my tongue is moving," Quatre returned, sniggering slightly. "And if you really believe I'm that callous I'm going to be offended—Duo'd totally wander with you down to the room, maybe even make out with you a bit, but he wants a relationship and not a one-night stand..."

"I can make exceptions," Duo noted, grinning slightly.

Quatre gestured him away languidly. "Besides that, I knew you wouldn't go for it...you're not that shallow. You won't drop some guy you like for the likes of _them_," he gestured with his thumb toward Duo and Trowa.

"I think I resent that," Trowa muttered considerately. "But I can see the point."

Quatre grinned at him.

"Ah well," Tro shrugged and gestured with his head at Belour. "What's your favorite flower?"

"Lilies, why?" she asked, tilting her head.

"What's your favorite color?" Trowa returned as if he hadn't heard her.

"I like...dusty purple...why?"

"I'm taking the car," Trowa noted, hopping to his feet happily and grabbing the keys Heero'd left on the table. "I won't be gone long...oh, Belour?"

She was giving him a confused look.

"You like chocolate, don't you?"

"She really likes the white chocolate from...uh...Marble," Heero noted helpfully. "She was telling us about it last time we were here."

"Oh! Right!" Trowa flashed the female his most charming grin...and disappeared out the door.

Belour blinked.

"Your beau's not the type to run away or get over jealous, is he?" Wufei asked the girl sweetly. "He's the type to step out and step over competitors, right?"

Belour was flushing very slowly as she looked around to him.

"Right?" Wufei persisted, starting to think. "What did you say his name was?" he stood.

"Spencer Righton," she returned, not following Wufei's train of thought.

"All right," Wufei muttered, moving toward the door himself. "I'll be back later...dusty purple?" he looked to Belour, but Quatre nodded...and the Chinese man disappeared.

"What is he up to?" Belour demanded, hopping to her feet and looking to Quatre.

"Why would we know?" Duo asked blankly, blinking at her. Actually, it should have been just as obvious to her as Trowa's actions had been. "So," he added, shifting forward again to meet her eyes. "Spencer, you said? Where does he work?"

"He moved here from Earth," she returned, meeting his eyes.

"But no job?" Heero asked blankly.

"Huh? Oh...no...no, he works," she composed herself and sat back down to frown at Quatre. "What are your friends up to?"

"I don't know, you heard what I did," Quatre gestured vaguely. "You embarrassed of his job or something?"

"What?" she asked blankly, then connected what he meant. "No! That's not it! He just works with landscaping."

"Landscaping?" Quatre was startled out of their game, giving her a completely uncomprehending look.

"He works for the government," she retorted.

"And you're sure he's not a spy?" Duo asked, raising an eyebrow. "Come to watch the Winner family?"

"What?" Belour was looking at him like he had two heads.

They didn't do anything illegal anyway, and really, hearing someone worked for the government always made Duo think of spies and undercover agents. He knew it wasn't fair...but he was very wary of this beau. He wasn't sure he trusted the guy.

He really wanted to meet him after all...maybe give him a run for Belour's money—actually, attention.

Heh, he wasn't going to spend the evening bored after all.

- -

"Oh, excuse me," Wufei muttered, having nearly knocked Spencer Righton over. "I'm sorry about that..."

"It's all right," the man muttered, trying to keep ahold of a tray of plants he was holding and right the ones that had fallen over. "I just..."

"Here," Wufei muttered, taking the tray. "I can hold it and you can fix them..."

"What are you doing here?" Spencer asked, focusing on his sunglasses in confusion as he righted the plants.

"Huh? Oh...I'm looking for a guy named Spencer."

Spencer stopped. "I'm Spencer..."

"Righton?" Wufei pursued, then grinned. "Hey...hi, I'm Chang Wufei," he shifted the box over to one arm in a feat Spencer could never hope to achieve, and used his free hand to lift the sunglasses and offer a hand. "I'm Chang Wufei...and I'm part of the group visiting with Quatre Winner."

"Mr....uh..." Spencer was obviously put off.

"Chang," Wufei returned, grinning slightly. "Just call me Wufei."

"Um...it's a pleasure," Spencer said quickly, offering his hand. "Can I help you?"

"Well, Belle was being herself and talked me into running an errand for her," he rolled his eyes with a happy grin. "She's so incredibly _female_..."

Spencer grinned at that, hesitating a moment and giving Wufei an interested look.

"Okay, she'd have called you herself...but with how she was talking," he flashed the guy another grin, "we decided to have supper with you invited."

Spencer froze and blinked at him.

"So I came to invite you," Wufei offered, putting on a show of uncertainty.

"I...I wouldn't want to impose..."

"Don't be ridiculous, it's no imposition at all...uh...where should I put this?"

"Oh! I'm sorry!" Spencer took the box from him quickly. "God, meeting one of the infamous friends of...man..." he took the box and started away with it.

Wufei followed. "Though I thought I might warn you about something, too, huh?"

"Warn?" Spencer stopped to look at him.

"My friend Trowa's had his eyes on Belle for a while now...he could overwhelm her a little."

Spencer turned to look at him in confusion.

"See? I got sent on an errand...so I figure I'll hang out here while you finish work," he gestured around the greenhouse with vague interest. "Then me and you can make a swing through town on the way back to the mansion. How do you feel about that?"

"Well," Spencer returned thoughtfully. "Bella is my girl...your friend can be as..."

"Belle, is a sweet hearted girl," Wufei agreed, changing tracks. "And she's said she wants Quatre's opinion of you...I suppose if you're not worried about it..." he started to shift away. "I mean, Tro's good, but if you're not..."

"She said that?" Spencer asked quietly.

"What sister doesn't want her brother's good opinion?" Wufei asked blankly. "I mean...I suppose there are some whose relationship with their brother isn't great...but when it's strong, I've never known a girl who didn't want her brother to approve as much as her parents."

Spencer looked slightly nervous. "You said he's your friend?" he asked, looking up.

Wufei nodded, smirking internally. It wasn't usually all that complicated to get someone to do exactly what you wanted them to do. He wasn't worried about Belle going to Trowa, but he was worried about Quatre's good opinion.

"He's not an ass or anything, is he?" Spencer asked, then, shook his head. "Never mind. I only have a bit of work left before I can go...you can tag along or go wait in the lobby."

"I'm interested in your setup," Wufei noted, looking around some more. "I'll play shadow until I get bored of it."

Spencer turned and genuinely grinned at him.

Wufei grinned back...and started to investigate the plants.

- -

Quatre had to wonder if he was really bound for hell. He'd set two of his best friends against his sister's boyfriend, and had sent Wufei to said boyfriend. He himself was supposed to get to know the guy to give Belle an opinion, which really meant that only Heero was above the fray.

"They were having a problem with the oxygen levels," Spencer explained to Quatre. "It was too pure and they knew how much would be all right for the humans—but not the plants. That's why I was asked to come up."

Quatre nodded.

Duo, meanwhile, had leaned over and was muttering in Belour's ear. He'd rested his hand lightly on hers, and hadn't moved it after starting to whisper.

Quatre really hoped she wasn't some twit virgin girl, or he'd have to end up kicking Duo's ass—and that would be harder than it seemed. He nodded again as the guy continued explaining about the plants he'd been watching and how the plants created more oxygen so the levels of this and that had to be shoved down everyone's throat because Quatre'd asked what he did for a living...

Trowa, for his part, had shown up with a bouquet of lilies for Belle, and a white-chocolate flower thing...it didn't fully look like a flower though. It had a flower shape so the women it was bought for could actually eat it. Duo'd been insinuating himself into her personal space since about the same time. They were doing it casually enough that Belour didn't seem to remember what had set off all the nonsense in the first place.

"So, uh...Duo," Wufei muttered happily. "What do you think about the plant life here?"

"It's...interesting," Duo returned, shifting back from his little private conversation with the female. "Did you say you just started?" he added to Spencer. "You're not the one who planned all this?"

"I will be revamping the park," Spencer returned, realizing that he hadn't had Belle's attention, if Quatre read his eyes right. "I haven't been here long, otherwise."

"Not staying?" Duo asked sweetly.

"I'll be here longer than you," the man noted civilly. "Since I gather you are leaving tomorrow."

Duo's face split into his feral grin for a brief moment—he appreciated that note—then went back to his pleasantly fake smile. "That's the good thing about my job...I go between Earth and the colonies a lot. I'm an architect, apprentice for now, but Victor has let me do our last house for Charles Reiver...the manufacturer of the six-eighty transport shuttle? Victor thought it'd be a good place for me to get my feet wet."

"Victor Panne?" Spencer asked, suddenly very interested in Duo. "You're the apprentice of Victor Panne?"

"He has more than one," Duo agreed, "but he's working with the other."

"Panne Fabrication?" Spencer demanded.

"Oh! I heard of that!" Belle perked up. "That's that guy who won all sorts of awards, isn't it? Aren't his houses expensive?"

Duo smirked slightly at the impressed tone in her voice and met her eyes. "They are, but if you can afford it you love the end product. I'd love to be able to make one for you, huh? Put a garden in the middle with swooping spiral staircases?"

Her face broke into a true smile.

Really, that wasn't entirely fair of Duo. Duo'd known Belour for years, and he'd had several conversations with her about her dream-home.

Quatre looked curiously back to Wufei and Spencer. If Wufei was really planning to help the guy, it'd be the time to distract the girl.

"You could do the garden, huh?" Wufei asked, nudging Spencer slightly. "Put a bunch of lilies in it..."

"And trees," Spencer noted, glancing briefly at Wufei. "Maybe some color-bands with a fountain in the center and that dusty-purple cosmos I showed you around the edges, huh?"

"That would be beautiful!" Belour breathed, her eyes going dreamy.

"Maybe add a balcony overlooking the garden so you could see it all from above," Duo agreed, looking away from Spencer to the girl. "Set it up so that on summer nights the full moon showed in the water."

Heero rubbed his face with a hand, though he didn't have to say anything for his message to become clear. This was painfully amusing to watch.

"Put a patio garden on that, too, huh?" Spencer offered, not even bothering to look at Duo. "Maybe some jasmine."

Duo smirked very slightly. "There's a type of glass you can see out of, but not into...could have that window facing the garden...maybe have a little creak flowing all round the house." He grinned slightly. "Put up some of that gauzy drapery you have in your room and..."

Spencer's expression changed instantly. He looked disbelieving and pissed as he met Duo's eyes.

"...and get you another four-poster bed since yours squeaks."

Heero started laughing silently and rose quickly, turning it into a coughing fit. "Excuse me," he coughed. "I'll...I'll be back..."

"You told me you'd fix my bed," Belour noted to Duo. Quatre doubted she was oblivious anymore to what Duo was doing, but he knew enough about her to catch her fancy. "I tore the bedding all off so you could get at the mattress and fix the damn springs."

"Sorry, sweet," Duo met her eyes with a grin. "I'm easily distracted."

Spencer glanced at Wufei, and he shook his head slightly. Spencer made a slight gesture and Wufei gestured back, putting that down.

"So," Quatre caught Spencer's attention easily. "Are you up for a promotion with this job? Is that why you took it?"

Spencer stared back at him a moment, then looked down without moving his head. "This job was a promotion."

Quatre wasn't expecting that.

Spencer sighed and shifted back in his seat. "I think I need to head home, Bella," he muttered. "I have to work early tomorrow and I don't want to usurp all of your brother's time."

"Worried you didn't impress him?" Heero asked sweetly, moving back into the room.

Spencer, who'd stood, stopped and blinked at the guy.

"Worried that your job isn't good enough for his sister? Figure Quatre's already decided against you?"

"Heero..." Belour started.

"No," Heero gestured at her calm. "It's a perfectly valid question...or are you more bothered by Duo's attentions?"

"It's obvious I'm not wanted here," Spencer informed Heero pointedly.

"Aren't you? We were looking forward to meeting you all day, seeing how you carried yourself...seeing how you dealt with our little annoyances," he gestured at Duo. "The jealousy is cute and all...but that's not how you keep the girl."

"You're an ass," Belour snapped, looking to Duo as the full game became obvious to her. "I didn't even think...oh...Spence..."

Heero smirked and receded so the man could focus on the woman. They muttered to each other quietly as Duo shifted back in his seat and folded his arms behind his head.

"Weren't you going to fix her bed?" Wufei asked Duo curiously, studying his fingernails. "You did tell her you'd make the squeaking stop."

"Yeah, I guess," Duo muttered, rising languidly and smirking more at Spencer. "Belour and I have been friends for the last four or five years. I do have to say you dealt with me rather even-handedly...though I do have to figure you're not one to fight."

Belle grabbed one of his muscled biceps pointedly, glaring into his eyes.

"I'm fixing your bed," Duo retorted to the look as he moved from the room. "Calm down."

"I haven't backed down," Trowa noted happily. "I'm much more subtle than our braided friend, though."

"What?" Belour asked him sweetly.

Trowa smirked at Spencer, rising to his feet as well, then moved around the pair easily. "I'm helping Duo."

Spencer glared after him.

"I told you it wasn't worth demanding about," Wufei noted happily as he also started toward the door. "The peanut-gallery has been properly distracted by the sweet-scented bed of a female...so you won't have to bother with us until it's time to chase us out."

Belour gasped a little at that, understanding his meaning, then started to smack at him...but he disappeared.

Heero stood there a moment with a smirk, looking Spencer over, then winked at Belour and headed from the room.

"You," Belour hissed, turning on Quatre.

"Me, what?" Quatre demanded. "If you like him then he's obviously good in sweet times...but what about the bad?" He rose to his feet and looked Spencer over as he headed to the door. "You may not want to tell him about _how_ Duo knows that your bed squeaks...or when he first found it out...or how many times he's promised you he'd fix it." He smirked at the guy. "And from me to you...as one man to another...if you hurt my sister it'll be more than your life. But if you _tell_ anyone about our names or the jobs you've come to realize we do...you'll wish you had just hurt her."

"Quatre!" Belour snapped.

"If he blows Duo's cover," Quatre said very pointedly to the girl, "you're not going to like what happens. If he mentions off-hand to someone that he knows who Victor's apprentices are, he's going to regret it. You _know_ we value our privacy," he glanced at Spencer, "so you better make sure he gets it, too. I'm going to make sure no one paws through your underwear for shits and giggles. This shouldn't take Duo more than a half hour to figure out. I'll see you in the morning...it was nice meeting you, Spence," he added, meeting the guy's eyes. "Have a good night."

Spencer nodded.

Quatre turned, and started for his sister's room.

He really figured Wufei would get into her drawers to bug him...and he wanted to be there so the thought of the attempt could supply ample reaction...he also wanted to give Spencer the time to rise to the height of his indignation. He wasn't going to approve of the man unless he could keep his head...and they would actually be leaving the next day...so he didn't have a lot of time.


	8. Chapter 8

**Eight**

"You feel big now?" Iraida demanded of Quatre, moving closer to him with crossed arms. "Big man for intimidating some little sweet boy?"

"Little sweet boy?" Quatre asked blankly. "You didn't meet Matt, did you? And I didn't intimidate him..."

"I _meant_ Spence," she retorted.

"You're annoyed at me for that?" Quatre asked her blankly, setting down his cup of orange juice. "You want me to just accept some guy I've never heard of right-off when my sister's saying she's serious about someone? I'm old enough to be taken seriously, Ray, and I damn well intend to be."

"What was that nonsense about hurting her being worth his life?" the woman snapped.

"Nonsense?" Quatre returned, nonplussed. "I don't understand what you mean."

She gave him a level look.

"Either sit down and have breakfast with me or storm off to pout. You're the one who was busy the last day and a half, I've been here."

"Except when you ran down to the pub?" she snapped.

"Hey, I called and asked if you wanted to join us after we were there," he gave her a look.

"You're spoiled," she informed him, moving to sit with him at the table. "I'd be glad you were leaving if you were actually doing what you normally do and staying another two days."

"We're actually going to L-5 this time," Quatre noted, moving the serving trays within her reach. "I may be able to come back afterwards, but..." he thought of Wufei and how he was already putting his walls up. "We haven't gone to L-5 in five years...and I think he'll need all of us."

She sighed tiredly, rubbing his knuckles lightly with her fingers, then started gathering her food. "You should have heard Bella last night after Spencer left," she noted.

"Why? He get all pissed off at her?"

"For what?" Iraida returned in confusion. "_She_ was pissed at _you_. She told us that you set Duo to courting her."

"Duo?" Quatre asked blankly.

"She's pissed at him, too," the other noted. "With how long they've been friends, she thinks it was a bastard thing for him to do."

"You wanna know the funny part?" Quatre muttered, starting to scoop some egg onto his toast. "Duo decided to do it all on his own—I set _Trowa_ to courting her. You're missing my point though. I did it to see what he'd do when we weren't there. I guess I will have to face her fury, won't I?" he made a face as he bit into the toast. "Oh well, I guess it's not the end of the world...I just have to make her see why I did it."

"Why _did_ you do it?" she snapped.

"To see how Spencer _reacted_," Quatre gave her a disbelieving look. "You need to get your hearing checked, Ray. I said the same thing a few times now."

She gave him a look.

"You gonna come down and visit us?" he added, deciding to leave that until he had to touch it again. "You and Siha didn't want anything to do with me this whole trip."

"You're having lunch with Siha, right?"

Quatre nodded.

"She'll tell you why she's avoiding you," the woman grinned slightly. "No doubt she's assuming you'll freak out like Addy did."

"What?" Quatre asked sharply, meeting her eyes. "What are you talking about?"

"I thought you were supposed to be some almighty trained warrior with the eyes of a hawk," she retorted dryly. "Go back to your breakfast, it's not my business to bandy around."

- -

"Don't go to 27," Heero protested, pacing up and down the hall. "I told you...they were trying to close that down, but a bunch of vets got permission to live there...and they've been making all sorts of noise."

"Noise?" Matty echoed blankly. "What are you talking about? They do have a bunch of hot-shot war-rick ex-soldiers there, sure, but my uncle said it should be fine as long as I just...don't do anything."

"What?" Heero asked blankly, stopping. "Whatever...don't go. It's not safe."

"And what will they do to me?" Matty retorted. "You're paranoid, Max. The wars are over."

"You're from earth and they're from space, _Matt_," Heero retorted. "You said you were born in Hangzhou, right? Well the Alliance was all over that..."

"I was _raised_ in New York," Matty retorted. "And I still don't see how it matters!"

"What will it take for you to believe me that it's not safe?" Heero snapped at him. "Don't go...especially alone...come on," he dropped his tone to cajoling. "If you go out there, you won't get back until six or seven tonight...I thought we were going to dinner."

"If I go, we won't?" Matty demanded in a severely level tone.

Heero tsked, pulling the phone away from his ear to compose himself. "Okay, fine. I'm ex-military," he snapped. "I'm a damn war-rick. Can you accept that? Can you accept that I have lines of intelligence not available to the common populace?"

"You're talking about that article in the newspaper the other day, aren't you?" Matty demanded. "The one saying experts warn of impending danger? I read that, too..."

"What part of 'other lines' meant the newspaper?" Heero retorted. "I happen to know that there are investigators on the colony as we speak, looking out for a possible fire."

"Fire?" Matty asked blankly.

Heero ran a hand down his face, realizing he probably shouldn't use Preventer lingo if he wanted his friend to take him seriously. "Fine...make me be an asshole, then. No, we _won't_ go out to dinner tonight if you go."

"Well _damn_," Matty snapped, his ire rising. "We'll just have to fuck again, won't we? We will anyway! It's not like you _care_ to take me nice places."

"What?" Heero snapped, pulled up short. "That's not what I...Matty..."

"My flight is leaving, Max," Matty noted darkly. "I'll have to suspend my phone until we're away from the colony."

"Matty, wait," Heero protested...as the line died. "Matty!"

The last had been a useless addition.

He ended the call irritably, glowering at the phone like it could understand him. The timer disappeared and a note of Matty's flight boarding flashed across the screen briefly.

"What's up?" Duo asked blankly.

"The idiot is going to 27," Heero snapped, rounding on his friend.

"He's not...not really," Duo protested, pulling out his phone and staring at it. "What the hell does he think?" He hit a few buttons and raised the thing to his ear.

"He's boarding," Heero snapped. "Hung up on me."

"Fuck!" Duo snapped, running a hand down his face. "Maybe we could cancel his flight?" he started for his bedroom. "I got the wire from Noin that there is a fire brewing...they think it could break out any day now."

"Nice," Heero muttered, following irritably. "You do that...I'm gonna go let the others know."

- -

"Well...you're going to be an uncle," Siha said quietly.

Quatre stared at her.

She hesitated almost uncertainly, then smiled slightly at him...and waited.

Had she really just said that?

Quatre couldn't get his mind around in the information.

"Uh..." she licked her lips nervously. "Aren't you...happy?"

"Happy?" he repeated blankly. "How are you pregnant?"

"The usual way, I imagine," she noted dryly, then raised an eyebrow at him.

"From..._who?_" he demanded. It bugged him that she hadn't given him the chance to meet the guy.

"Well...I'm not...entirely...sure."

Quatre felt like his jaw should have dropped as he continued staring at her.

"Quatre!"

Quatre turned gratefully to Heero...and realized his friend wasn't happy.

"Quatre! My idiot boyfriend just headed to 27 and Duo said Noin gave him word."

Quatre stared at him, too.

"Boyfriend?" Fasiha demanded blankly. "You're gay?"

"What? No, bi...wh..." Heero shook his head and looked back to Quatre. "He's trying to cancel the flight."

"Matty is?"

"What?" Heero stared at him a moment in incomprehension. "Are you okay? I meant Duo."

"Oh...huh," Quatre sat back in his seat as he tried to think. "Fasiha is pregnant," he added to his friend. "Not sure who the dad is."

Siha stared at him in disbelief.

"That's talent," Heero noted dryly. "You ever hear of a condom? Or that shot?" that was obviously to the woman herself. He focused back on Quatre. "Where's Trowa?"

"Probably in his room," Quatre muttered. "And since you're telling me, I'm assuming you're keeping it," Quatre noted, tilting his head.

"It's not an it," she snapped at him. "It's a baby."

"How far along are you?" Heero asked, hesitating a moment.

"Probably six weeks," she returned, blinking at him.

"It's still an it," he retorted, snorting in amusement. "No sex, no face...looks more like a shrimp than a baby...but whatever." He disappeared.

"Shrimp sounds good," Quatre noted, meeting his sister's eyes.

She gave him a look that let him know exactly how much she appreciated that.

"So are you going to bother figuring out who the father is, or have you been a whore?"

"You're worse than Addy," she snapped, her tone injured as she looked back to her plate.

"If you can't tell who the man is who helped you get pregnant," Quatre noted, "that's your own too bad. If you really have been a slut, then you probably shouldn't be offended by _me_ noting it. I don't actually care if you keep it, I just want to know how much a father-figure I'm going to be."

"None, if you're going to be a dick like this," she snapped.

Quatre flashed her a grin. "All right, call and let me know when you go into labor...and I just realized that he said there's definite activity on 27 and Matty is heading for it...excuse me," he leaned over and hugged her, then grinned until she smiled back at him. He kissed her forehead and rested a hand briefly on her abdomen as he really realized she was going to have a baby...then turned to find Duo.

- -

Matty glared accusingly at the stars out the window of the ship. He knew that Max was paranoid about 27, but it had an old-town that was supposed to be a good touring spot. It also had a huge music store...a place that had tons of old music for sale...and live joints, too! There weren't any groups playing that he knew, but Taili would never let him live it down if he didn't hit the place since he was there...not to mention how bad it'd kill Abel if he'd had the chance to hit one of the lives and passed it up.

Besides, he liked hanging out with his father and uncle and all, but they treated him like he was a kid...he had more liberties than Lifon, for sure, but his little sister wasn't even sixteen. He was tired of the paternal directives. The guy'd been wary about meeting up with Max, and hadn't let down his guard. The first time Matt'd come back from visiting, his uncle had made some sideways comment about him actually _coming_ back.

He didn't need Max telling him not to go somewhere out of paranoia alone.

Matty pushed his hair behind his ear, realizing there was a guy standing at the end of the row and looking at him. It didn't seem to be a safe attention, but then again, Max's hadn't felt safe at first, either.

"Hey, kid," the guy muttered.

Matty glanced sidelong at him, glad he hadn't taken his headphones out.

"Your momma know where you are?"

Matty tapped the ear-bud, then made a face. The guy wasn't going to leave him alone. He made the motions like he was pausing his music...and blinked as the music program opened and spun to a random song, halfway through. "Uh...what?" he asked, looking up.

"Your momma know where you are?" the guy grinned at him.

"My mom is dead," Matt retorted, glowering at him.

"Oh...sorry," the guy receded slightly, though still very focused. "Where you from?"

"I'm sorry, I'm listening to my music," he returned, hitting play...and turning up the volume.

The guy sneered slightly at him, then moved away.

Matty sort of wished the flight was more populated. The shuttle could hold a hundred or more passengers, but at the most he'd only say there were seventy, and that was probably stretching it.

He didn't particularly appreciate the guy walking by the end of his isle repeatedly, either.

'_I dunno, he just keeps walking by,_' Matty explained to Max. Something about the man had seemed very intimidating. '_And he's not looking at me obviously, but I'm pretty sure he IS looking at me._'

'_Well, just keep in the main of the group,_' Max muttered. '_Don't stray off by yourself...I wish you hadn't gone._'

'_I'm starting to wish the same thing,_' Matty noted.

'_We couldn't get them to turn around,_' Max added. '_They were saying something about setting things off and...just be really careful, all right?_'

'_Turn around?_' Matty returned blankly. '_How do you mean?_'

'_I mean I tried to get the flight docked before it had even left, and they wouldn't do it because they know there's shit going on out there and don't want to tempt fate._'

'_You couldn't get them to turn the flight around,_' Matty protested.

'_Not now. Two years ago it would have been done without argument._'

Matty stared at the phone a moment, but War messaged and it distracted him.

...Warrick...War-rick...the thought was as vague as the phrase. War-rick was a term used to describe men who'd survived both wars, but it was only used if the person had frequently been in the heat of battle. War'd said it was an assumed name, too...the guy stopped at the end of his row again.

He was getting an uneasy feeling about this...there was another guy who was moving up and down the isle. There were actually a few guys with that same restless energy...and he wasn't the only one who'd been talked to, or was being talked to.

Something wasn't right.

'_Hey, I have to suspend,_' Max noted. '_We're going. I know you're docking, so I'll turn it on as soon as I can._'

'_All right,_' Matty agreed.

They unloaded from the ship, and he could see the other passengers were nervous as well...and something wasn't right.

'_Something's not right,_' he noted to Max, hoping he'd show back up online.

"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen," a more charming man muttered, looking them all over brightly. "I feel I must apologize, but we need you to come with us this way..."

The group started moving as a herd, still nervous and uncertain, but willing to follow the man who looked almost like he could be staff.

Almost only counted in horseshoes and grenades...that's what his dad and uncle would note very pointedly.

"No no, Mr. Independent," the man who'd spoken to him before muttered in his ear, moving up behind him. "We go this way."

"No, I do not," Matty muttered, starting to pull away from him...and his stomach dropped as something hard and cold was pressed into his back.

"No, you go that way," the guy said quietly. "And you do it without a fuss."

"What's going on?" Matty hissed, not moving.

"I didn't say ask questions," the guy muttered, jabbing him painfully in the side.

Matty hissed, doubling over partially.

"Move, kid. You're the one from Earth, aren't you?"

"Fuck you," Matty returned, realizing that his heart couldn't be beating faster because it had stopped.

The pain came again, sharper, and he stumbled slightly...and was shoved at the same time.

It hurt...and he was nearly falling to his knees with the pain of the repeated action before he complied. There had been men hanging back around him, but part of them had moved forward...and there were three around _him_.

His phone buzzed.

"You can ignore that until we catch up with the others," the man with the gun noted in a dark growl. "Just keep being quiet like this, and we won't have any problems at all."

- -

Heero narrowed his eyes as he waited, then looked up to Duo. "How did you set his pax?"

"Huh?" Duo asked, looking up from whatever he was doing. "What do you mean?"

"Did you turn on stats?"

"No, but I can," Duo noted, looking around to him from the laptop. "Why?"

"He said something wasn't right when I was suspended, and I just asked if he was okay and he hasn't replied yet."

Duo stared at him, then focused on the laptop.

"I told him not to go," Heero growled.

"And how should he know that you have a direct line to the Preventers?" Wufei asked sweetly, if quietly. "Don't even start that shit."

"I just..."

"Have a bad feeling?" Quatre muttered, looking them all over somberly and pressing his nail to his teeth and lips. "I do."

"Maybe he's just busy," Trowa offered quietly, looking way. "Maybe he's gotten distracted by someone at the port."

Heero laughed coldly.

No one believed that for a minute.

- -

"Let me see that," the man muttered, yanking Matty's phone from him.

'_Tut tut, looks like rain..._'

Matty focused on his phone sharply as the man's eyes narrowed.

What the hell had _that_ been?

'_Tut tut...looks like rain..._' the sound of rain came from the thing.

"Put me on it," the man snapped, shoving the phone back at Matty. He caught a brief glimpse of rain on a pure black background, pooling at the bottom...and the image disappeared as his hand touched it.

"Uh...what?" Matty asked blankly.

"Put me on your damn phone," the guy snapped, gesturing irritably at the thing. "I don't want to see your screen saver."

'_First lieutenant Jaden Timorre, 89th MS unit A._' the words flashed across the screen with a picture of the man...only he was younger in it...and there was one of his fingerprints in the corner.

Matty blinked at that.

"Do it," the guy snapped, shoving at him.

"I don't know how," Matty protested, moving away from him slightly. He looked the room over briefly, noting that it looked like a clinic lounge or something.

"You need to comply with my demands," the man informed him evenly. It wasn't the guy who'd led him away from the port at gun-point. This guy had been with the man who looked like he was in charge. "You'll be compensated."

"Compensated?" Matty repeated, meeting his eyes. "Comply? What the fuck are you talking about?"

The man's eyes flashed irritably.

'_What's going on?_' Max demanded. '_Why aren't you answering me?_'

'_This guy wants me to put him on my phone,_' Matty was glad he could type fast.

"Hey!" the guy pulled the thing away from him again.

'_Tut tut, looks like rain...tut tut...looks like rain..._'

"What's going on?" another man asked, moving closer to him curiously. "Why do you have his phone?"

"He's got pax on it," the man noted, showing him the screen.

If it'd taken the first guy's print...Matty really wanted to get _all_ of their prints. He licked his lips slightly, then swallowed and looked back to the room.

If what he was gathering was right, then there were probably forty passengers and the rest were part of whatever group this was.

Didn't it fucking figure that Max had been right? He'd thought Max was paranoid and then he gets a gun shoved against his liver...

The second guy took the phone...which started the cooing about rain again.

"That's obnoxious," the guy noted, passing the phone back to Matty. "Turn it off."

"How?" Matty asked blankly.

'_Colonel Rin Qingfu, 53rd MS unit A._' A picture of that man flashed across the screen, too, with his print.

'_Shit,_' Max muttered. '_It's showing them the screen saver, right?_'

'_Yeah,_' Matty agreed, paging through the options. '_They want me to turn that off and add them._'

'_You don't know how,_' Max noted...probably happily.

"Well?" the colonel snapped. "Who are you talking to?"

"My boyfriend," Matty snapped.

The man snatched the phone away from him again.

'_Tut tut, looks like rain..._'

The man tossed the thing back into Matty's hand and glared at him.

"He's the one who put that on there," Matty explained quickly. "I don't know how to work it at all."

"Lying to us won't help," the first man noted.

"I'm not lying," Matty muttered, drooping slightly.

"Ranger! Get over here!" the colonel snapped, turning and walking away as he gestured at Matty. "You deal with him."

"I don't know how to use it!" Matty protested as his fear flashed through him.

It was the man who'd put the gun in his back.

'_What's the matter?_'

Matty didn't have time to respond to that before the man had joined them, looking him over skeptically and extending his hand.

Matty passed the phone.

"If he's using an As model with pax," another man snapped, moving up to him and shoving the guy's hand back toward Matt. "Don't touch it, idiots, it could store your prints."

"Kid says he doesn't know how to use it," the first one muttered.

"Shit, look at his eyes," the new guy muttered, looking Matty over with a sneer. "Pretty boy probably lies...I'd like to wipe that innocent look off his face..."

That...was a scary comment.

Matty receded more.

"Go away, Gene, you're scaring the boy," the man who'd had the gun noted, shoving the man off. The phone was singing some song about...honey?

What the hell.

Matty shifted slightly, wondering where the fuck Max had come up with that.

"Just don't have anyone else touch it," the guy muttered, still studying Matty's face. "You're already copied if he has that."

"He's the earth boy," Ranger noted dryly. "He doesn't have ties to anyone who'd have access to that database."

What?

_I'm ex-military. I'm a damn war-rick. Can you accept that?_

...well, shit.

"He also shouldn't be able to afford pax," the other man noted, then shook his head and looked back to Matty.

"My boyfriend got it for me," Matty muttered, staring directly into his eyes. He didn't even feel the remotest bit of guilt for the lie. Hell, with the way they'd all been paying attention to him, War may as well have been his boyfriend—he doubted the sex would be any worse than Max and that was better than he'd had before...

"Your boyfriend bought you a three-hundred dollar program for your phone?" Gene demanded, raising an eyebrow. "You expect me to _believe_ that?"

"I do," Ranger noted, shoving at Gene. "I'd do it for a mouth like that," he smirked slightly. "Go on."

"You're not supposed to humiliate him," the first man noted pointedly, studying Matty's face as Gene walked away.

"Huh?" Ranger looked back to Matty in confusion, then smirked slightly. Matty had blushed and was trying hard not to think of the numerous comments Max had made about his mouth that had sounded similar. "That's not humiliation..."

"Just drop it," the guy snapped. "And give him the damn phone back. If I have to hear that song play through again I'm going to do something to that piece of equipment that wouldn't be approved of."

Ranger gave him an exasperated look and passed the phone back to Matty.

"I need you to add me to your okay list," the guy repeated.

'_First lieutenant Deroy Hanager, unit 57 special._'

'_Oh FUCK,_' had been Max's comment at some point.

'_Fuck?_' Matty asked, biting at his lip as he started paging through the pax options again.

'_Just do what HE says,_' Max returned. '_He has the military clearance to hit you, even IF they're following the conventions...and they've been trained to hurt without much bruising._'

"Well?" the other man asked.

Ranger had his arms crossed.

Matty controlled his heartbeat as he looked back up to them and shrugged. "I don't know _how_."

Ranger moved...and a sharp hot pain lanced down his jaw-line. He stumbled back a few steps until his back hit the wall, raising a hand to his jaw...and realized he was bloody. He stared at his hand a moment and looked to Ranger in confusion.

"Just do what you're told," Ranger said quietly. There was something eerily comforting in his tone, and he had his arms crossed again.

"I don't know how," Matty repeated, wiping his hand off on his pants.

"Wait!" the first guy, Jaden, protested, grabbing at his wrist.

"You're an idiot," Ranger snapped, shoving him against the wall...and wiping off Matty's chin with his sleeve.

"Hey!" Matty protested, jerking back from that.

"Damn it, Ranger," Jaden snapped, pacing off in a small circle. "Damn it..."

Matty pressed his hand to his chin again.

"Stop doing that," Ranger's tone was still quiet...and still deadly.

"Doing what?" Matty muttered, swallowing slightly.

"You don't need to get blood all over your clothes," the man supplied, glaring back at him.

"I don't have anything to _wipe_ it with," Matty snapped.

Ranger's hand twitched and Matty receded, looking down.

"He's nineteen for god's sake," Jaden snapped, shoving at Ranger slightly. "Get him something _clean_ to put on that."

Ranger glared at Matty a moment longer, then turned and walked away.

"You see what I have to deal with?" Jaden groused, gesturing after the man and looking toward the one who'd told them all to head one direction. "Christ...are you all right, kid?"

Matty nodded, not quite looking at him.

"Ranger is from a group called Specials," he added, studying Matty's face. "It's not the mobile-suit type of specials either. They're highly trained soldiers that have had the various conventions carved into their brains—and they have a bit of clearance with it." Ranger moved back to them with a paper-towel. "Thank you," he took the thing and wiped at the sore spot on Matty's face. "Here...you do it...Ranger, go ahead and check everyone else out. I'm sure Rab will be ready to make our announcements soon."

Ranger gave Matty another long dark stare, then turned and walked away.

"We have a few of them," Jaden added. "Any normal soldier could lose himself and beat the living _shit_ out of you," he noted that pointedly, "for not obeying. But the conventions state 'minor forms of coercion'," he made air quotes. "So they trained some soldiers to control themselves. That's him," he gestured at Ranger again. "So let's keep things from getting unpleasant. Stop playing, I just want to see who is on your list...and then it'll be fine."

Max muttering about hackers traveled through his mind.

He started to shake his head.

"I'll call Ranger back over here," Jaden half-purred, studying Matty's eyes.

"I don't know how to do it."

"It's pax," the guy said calmly. "It's user-oriented."

"It's pax-pro," Matty returned, frowning slightly. "And I didn't set it up."

"Pax-pro?" the guy repeated, narrowing his eyes. "That's a five-hundred dollar program."

Matty's mouth rounded into an 'o' of disbelief. "He said he got it for like...a hundred!"

The guy raised an eyebrow. "You believed him?"

"He doesn't lie to me," Matty muttered, looking down. He'd never had qualms with lying to save his own skin. He'd lied to his father's face when it kept him from getting into deep shit. This situation seemed to equate the 'deep shit' merit badge...he could commit to the lie.

"Why don't you know how to use it?" Jaden muttered, still skeptical.

"He installed it and gave it to me...said he made me administrative...but then I came out to space and..."

The guy tutted.

Matty looked up to him in confusion.

"You're lying to me."

He grinned slightly back at the man. "Only a very little."

The guy's eyes narrowed and he turned. "Ranger!"

Ranger, who'd been talking to an elderly woman, excused himself and moved toward them with a slight bounce in his step.

Matty felt his stomach sink, watching the other man...who was watching him.

He _really_ wished he'd have listened to Max.

- -

"Hey!" Duo muttered sharply over his shoulder to Heero. "Look."

Heero moved around Quatre to look at the screen. Duo had a video playing with a messaging window open next to it.

'_You're not supposed to hack our system, War,_' Noin had noted, but there hadn't been any other notices.

"...and as we don't want to make a public spectacle of ourselves," a man was muttering into the camera, "we've decided to take a quiet approach directly to the people whom matter."

Heero studied his face carefully, trying to make a judgment of his character. His face was shaped for the aesthetic, and his voice oozed charm and charisma...and that was Matty.

Heero focused sharply on his friend in the background, tapping the full-screen mode.

Matty was sitting behind the man with his phone held between his hands like it offered comfort. His eyes were somewhat focused, and he didn't look too scared...but there was a gash on his chin...and a bruise peaking out of the edge of his shirt.

'_You didn't tell me he hit you,_' Heero noted, glad he had his own phone out.

On the screen, Matty glanced down at his own phone, then flashed a guilty look at the camera. He glanced to the side and bit his lip, looking back to the speaking man.

So...they were live, and he was being watched.

'_It was that Specials man, wasn't it?_' Heero noted, feeling anger boiling up through his blood. It was a strange sensation, and he had the brief thought of wanting to consider it...but the situation was too prominent. '_I can read lips._'

Matty glanced at his phone again, then licked his lips. 'They call him Ranger,' he mouthed very carefully.

'_If you can do it less obviously, I should be able to read that, too. Ranger?_'

'Yes,' Matty mouthed, looking down.

Heero considered him a moment, then looked over his body. He wasn't carrying himself in a way that suggested he'd been broken. Whatever had been done to him hadn't been enough to terrify him. Probably scared him shitless, though. If the way his eyes darted to the side counted as anything, the man who did it was just off screen.

"And according to the conventions," the man speaking noted.

'_What do they call the guy speaking?_' Heero asked quickly.

'Pan,' Matty mouthed, licking his lips again. 'He's not in charge. A guy named Rab is.'

Heero blinked at that.

"...we have chosen a small colony with little to no civilians present," the man added. "We have forty-seven prisoners of war."

"Hostages," Duo countered in a low growl.

"We will treat the prisoners with care as far as we are able," the man added. "Until the situation is resolved, we will keep them with us. You, boy, state your name and age...any medical conditions that may need addressing."

"Matty Williams, nineteen," Matty returned promptly, studying the camera. "No medical conditions."

"Where are you from?"

"Earth," Matty returned, not looking up at the speaker.

"You, woman..." he moved to an older lady to Matty's left.

'_You trust me, right?_' Heero asked. '_I don't care what bullshit they're spewing, you're all hostages to make the government capitulate...independence my ass. They should treat you all right, they're claiming to be an independent nation and to be taken seriously at all they'll have to stick to every goddamn convention ever written. If they want their independence, they'll have to take it by force, because there's no way you're going to be there for more than a day._'

'_What do you mean?_' Matty returned.

'_I mean we're coming to get you,_' Heero returned, looking around as he saw the same look on Quatre and Duo's faces. '_We're getting all of you out...forty-seven, he said? Not that many, really. Just relax and don't fight them._'

'_They want me to add them...and I don't know how._'

'_You don't know how, and even if you could figure it out, you wouldn't be able to,_' Heero noted happily. '_Duo's not letting them into your machine when we fully intend to use it to our advantage. Do whatever you can to keep them from taking it away from you, and if they demand you turn it off, don't hesitate._'

'_I'm scared._'

'_You'll be all right, Matty,_' Heero wished the simple words could be as reassuring as he wanted them to be. '_We're going to get you out of there._'

'_That doesn't make me not scared._'

'_I'll bring you a big gun,_' Heero noted, grinning slightly to himself. '_How will that do you?_'

'_I can't shoot...Ranger._'

Heero dropped back into the chair behind Duo, running a hand down his face. They were in the L-5 port, but hadn't even left the gate.

"We need to head toward the armory," Duo noted, looking around at them all. "We need to get where we can get a flight out of here."

"Let's go, then," Heero muttered, rising to his feet.

"I got them to redirect our baggage," Trowa noted, rejoining the group. "You all look ready for action."

"Yeah," Duo muttered, closing his laptop and rising to his feet. "You missed it, Tro. The residents of 27 contacted the government officials with an announcement. They have prisoners of war...and they're declaring their independence."

"How can they have prisoners of war if there is no war?" Trowa demanded sharply.

"Funny, that," Heero muttered, starting toward the military section of the port. "As soon as they took Matty, they got one."

"All for the love of one sweet boy!" Wufei put on a dramatic pose...but didn't fall behind.

"Love...lust...friendship," Quatre shrugged. "It falls in there somewhere."

"You lust for the boy?" Wufei demanded, flashing him a grin.

"No more than you do," Quatre retorted.

"Shit, Heero, we aren't the only bi ones here," Duo purred happily, flashing Quatre a wicked grin. "You workin' on Tro yet?"

Heero flashed them a grin, though his mind wasn't on their conversation.

They had to get out to the colony without being spotted. He was pretty sure 27 had a port access that had been walled off from the inside. Part of the outer seal, if what he remembered was right, had been corrupted, and it'd cost less to wall it off than to fix the seal.

That gave them access from the outside...but getting in wasn't really the problem. The problem was in getting close enough to _get_ in without jeopardizing the hostages.

"Do you suppose I could kill Ranger?" he half-purred at Duo.

"I take it he's the reason our boy has that gash and bruise? And the blood, I imagine."

Heero looked at him sharply.

"On his pants," Duo agreed. "At least I think its blood...we'll have to ask him when we see him. And no...I don't think you can really kill him. They're being as civil as they can manage and if you do that it'll make him a martyr."

"I don't mind that," Heero snarled.

"The very soul of civil disobedience, you," Duo noted dryly. "Let's wait until we're face to face with him to make any solid calls."

"Right."


	9. Chapter 9

**Nine**

"You're on blue-deck!" some major ordered, pointing toward a ship.

Duo knew he wasn't the only one to ignore the man.

"Soldier!"

Duo flipped the guy off, turning into the gate that had the food supply. If he had his rank, that man would have been cow towing to him like a good little groveler.

"Hey!" the man snapped in annoyance.

"Drop it," another major muttered, wide-eyed as he moved closer to them.

"They just..."

"_Leave_ it, Ronning," the second man snapped. "I think we need to forget we saw them at all."

"What?" Ronning asked blankly.

"Those were the Gundam pilots," the second man whispered, looking around the area to be sure no one could hear him. "I didn't hear anyone saying they were coming, so they probably don't have the clearance..."

"Then we should stop them!" Ronning started.

"If you pursue this, I'm going to put you on leave," the second man snapped. "If they're involved, then shit's hit the fan. Just pretend nothing happened."

Ronning narrowed his eyes at the other.

"Trust me, if we make a noise, we'll wish we hadn't."

"He flipped me off," the guy snapped.

"Yeah, if they hadn't left office, you'd be on your knees. We're nothing but peons to them...and we don't _want_ to be aware of them being here."

Ronning stared at him.

"Blue deck!" the second man snapped at the soldiers who came running up the isle much like the former pilots had. "Let's move, people!"

"Sir!"

Ronning looked from the soldiers back to his friend, then nodded slightly.

He had a feeling he'd regret it...but really, that just made it a lose-lose situation. He was fucked if he did and fucked if he didn't...but at least if he didn't he'd make it out without physical injury.

That had to count for _something_.

- -

"I want to be understanding," Ranger purred, pacing around where Matty was sitting.

"I thought you weren't supposed to keep me separate from the group," Matty muttered, wishing the throbbing along his forearm would stop. He kept thinking a bruise would show up, but the initial red mark was already gone.

"Don't _start_ making that noise," Ranger muttered, rounding on him.

Matty flinched back, waiting for the pain.

"He has a point," Jaden noted, studying him.

"He doesn't even talk to anyone when he's out there," Ranger returned, still eyeing the nineteen year old. "He sits there and stares at his phone."

"I'm _trying_ to figure it out!" Matty snapped back, glad no one was around who mattered when tears filled his eyes. He wiped at them irritably, then looked back down to his arm. It still ached, and he was pretty sure it was the bone.

Jaden nodded slightly, looking up to Ranger.

"You're not serious," Ranger protested. "You let him get off like he's..."

"You _looked_ him up yourself," Jaden snapped back. "He's only had pax on the phone about a week...if that. I believe him."

"Well, I believe his boyfriend would have told him how to add us by now," Ranger noted, still studying Matty's face.

Matty looked up to him, wiping the tears away again. He hated that Max wasn't on anymore. Max'd said they'd come save him, then talked a little more to him before going quiet...no explanation on why, either. He just...wasn't on. None of them were... "He's not on," Matty noted, looking between them both. "I don't know where he is...he's just not..." he wiped at the tears again.

"It's all right," Jaden noted reassuringly. He liked the good-cop bad-cop routine. He'd send Ranger away now and start trying to sweet talk Matty into cooperating again...

As if Matty had a _choice_.

"Well?" the leader, Rab, muttered, moving over to look in on them. They were in a small office off the main room. The door had been left open, but Matty was pretty sure the only one anyone could see was Jaden.

"Nothing," Ranger snapped, pacing behind Matty.

"Come on, son," Rab muttered, moving into the room. "I'm sure Ranger's made himself clear by now...and according to the conventions we'll have to replace anything we break."

"Even my bones?" Matty snapped back, wiping at his eyes again.

"Eh?" Rab muttered.

"He's got an attitude, Sir," Ranger snapped.

Jaden didn't respond, considering Matty's face.

Matty raised his left arm—it was shaking, and he was trying very much to hold it still, meeting the man's eyes.

"What'd you do?" Rab demanded, moving forward and grabbing the arm.

Matty flinched back from the touch, hissing and trying to yank the arm away.

"Just pressure," Ranger snapped, glaring accusingly at Matty.

"He's not faking this," Rab snapped, a look of annoyance crossing his face. "Haven't you _touched_ him?"

Ranger moved forward with that same uncoiled motion that usually accompanied the pain, and Matty tried to dodge backwards. It knocked the chair over under him so his pained arm was caught in the leader's hands...and that _really_ hurt.

"_Ow..._" Matty tried to find his feet, but the chair foiled him...and cooperatively twisted under his foot so one of the legs hit him hard in the back of his thigh.

Rab yanked him away from the chair—lifting him easily, like he was a small child—and set him down beside Jaden's legs...letting him go.

Matty curled down as the pain seared his nerves, knowing one thing and one thing only. Jaden didn't hurt him, Jaden seemed to understand...and Jaden hadn't moved.

"What the hell are you _thinking!?_" Rab exploded at Ranger, turning and slamming the door to the room closed. "He's _nineteen years old!_"

"That's old enough to join the army!" Ranger snapped back. "That's old enough to go to war!"

"So if he were a _soldier_," Rab snarled, "I wouldn't turn a hair...but he's not. He's a damn civilian...he works at a home-repairs shop for Christ's sake!"

"He's _lying_ to us! Something's _up_ with his damn phone!" Ranger turned and kicked the chair Matty'd been sitting in across the room. "He's _got_ pax-pro! He said his boyfriend bought it for him!"

Rab focused down on Matty.

"Why do you even give a damn about my phone?" Matty demanded of the man. He was curled up and leaning against Jaden's leg with his arm crossed over his chest. "You haven't bothered anyone else for theirs..."

"Honestly?" Rab asked carefully. "Honestly, we have everyone's phones monitored, but that program on your phone won't let us access it. We can't verify what you say. For all we know, you _could_ be talking to your boyfriend...or you could be talking to police...or you could be talking to some war-rick bastard trained just as much as the Gundam pilots. We need to verify your contacts or we're going to have to make you turn it off...we don't want to do that, I hope you've gathered that much. I know this isn't an ideal situation," he kneeled down so they were eye to eye. "So I need you to cooperate."

"Don't hit me," Matty muttered, shifting back more against Jaden's leg.

Rab considered him a long moment, then looked up to Ranger.

Ranger paced of and kicked Matty's chair again...which made it fall to pieces.

Matty wished he could hide from the man...

"Leave, Ranger," Rab said evenly.

"But, Sir..."

"_Leave,_" Rab spat, looking up at him.

Ranger drew himself up, glared down at Matty, then turned and stormed from the room, slamming the door closed behind him.

"There," Rab muttered, moving closer—it made Matty think of a skittish cat. Careful steps with a hand outstretched... "Let me see it..."

"Gene said we shouldn't touch it anymore," Jaden noted.

"Pro has the ability to synch to databases," Rab agreed. "But...come on, we looked at his profile. The only unknown is this boyfriend he keeps mentioning."

Matty set his phone in the man's hand.

'_Tut tut, looks like rain...tut tut...it looks like rain..._'

Jaden made an annoyed noise, looking away.

"What _is_ your problem with that?" Rab demanded, focusing on the screen. "It's..."

"It's an old kid's song," Jaden retorted. "Some weird-ass remix, sure...but it's from some kid's show...my sister listens to that kind of weird shit."

"A kid's song?" Rab asked, then noticed the song was saying something about honey...and bees. He looked back to Matty.

"My boyfriend set it up," Matty shrugged, wiping the tears from his eyes before they could fall on their own. "I have no idea..."

"Who is your boyfriend?" Rab asked, passing the phone back over.

'_Colonel Marshal Gerrange, 41st MS unit A._'

How did Rab come out of that?

'_Ooh, baby,_' Max's reply popped up. '_You just made my DAY._'

Matty didn't dare reply to that, meeting the man's eyes. "His name is Max Tsuyo," Matty explained, swallowing slightly.

"Ah," the man nodded slightly. "You been with him long?"

If they'd looked him up, Matty had a feeling they knew the answer already.

"Not really," he muttered, wiping his eyes again. "We started seeing each other a week or so before my trip out here."

"And he bought you pax-pro?" Rab raised his eyebrows.

Matty smiled slightly at him, then looked down again.

"You only got that program after you were _in_ space," Rab added considerately. "You have to understand, we have to protect our interests...we looked into your phone history...and you've only had that on there a week at the most."

Matty nodded, wiping at his eyes again. "Max and his friends were doing a tour...and they were in the L-3 cluster...and me and my dad went to check out the set for Tainted...and I stayed the night with him."

"Your dad?" Rab asked blankly.

"No...with Max," Matty rubbed his eyes again. "He put it on my phone because I hadn't said which flight I was on or anything and he had no idea when to expect me or if I was running late..." he grinned slightly. It was true enough, Max had been bugged by it that day.

"Good night?" Rab asked, grinning slightly. "I imagine, if he dropped five-hundred on your phone."

Matty frowned up at him, not liking the way that sounded.

"Ooh, sorry...bad phrasing..." Rab looked up to Jaden. "You really don't know how to add?" he asked, looking back down to Matty.

Matty nodded. "It doesn't make sense to me...where is the add function?"

"It's a customizable menu," Rab returned, smiling slightly at him. "If you can't find it, your boyfriend might have forgot to add it in...and I'd have to see the screen to help."

Matty frowned more, looking down.

That'd kick ass...have Max pop up some comment that they weren't supposed to see...

"That's what I thought," Rab returned with a slight grin. "You can't really add us?"

Matty met his eyes again, half-expecting to get hit.

"We're going to have to ask you to turn it off," Rab informed him, rising carefully to his feet. "I hate to inconvenience you..."

"But..." Matty started. "No one else..."

"We can't have you jeopardizing our integrity," Rab snapped, narrowing his eyes down at Matty. "If you refuse to turn it off for us, we'll take it from you."

And that was exactly what he Max had said for him not to let happen.

He nodded, swallowing slightly as he raised his phone...he stared longingly at Max's chat-screen, then opened the menu and hit the power button.

The phone chirped its little goodbye song, and Matty lowered it, looking up to Rab.

"Take him to the bathroom and let him wash his face," Rab suggested to Jaden. "Then let him join the others."

"Yes, sir," Jaden returned, twitching his leg slightly so Matty moved away from it.

Rab nodded once more at Matty, then turned and left the room with the door open again.

"What's the verdict?" Ranger asked, sliding back in.

Matty, who'd been halfway to his feet, stumbled backwards away from the man as panic surged through his system.

"Whoa!" Jaden muttered, catching his arm before he could fall. "It's all right..." he glanced back at Ranger, who was considering Matty with narrowed eyes. "Get out of here...he's turned it off."

Ranger considered Matty another moment, then turned and disappeared.

"I knew I let it go too long," Jaden hissed, helping Matty right himself. "You're not going to try anything with me, are you? Me and you can just run to the bathroom? Your eyes are all red and you can see tears all over."

Matty wiped at his face again, then nodded his consent. He didn't particularly care if anyone else seen he'd been crying...but he had a feeling Rab didn't want them to and didn't want it to show up on any camera—they'd set one up in the main room.

"I don't know about you," Jaden added as they started into the hall. "But I'm starving...we can go hit the buffet, huh?"

Matty nodded again, looking away. His arm was still throbbing and his leg, too, from the chair.

"You like chicken, don't you?" Jaden added. "I think there's some beef in it, but it was mostly chicken tonight...and they'll probably be getting the bedding out soon. You tired?"

Matty nodded again, still not meeting his eyes as they turned a corner.

"Well...they'll turn the lights down. Sucks that you don't have your music to listen to, though, huh? Would probably easier for you...if you could just add..."

"If I could just add I wouldn't be all alone," Matty snapped, wiping at the tears in his eyes again angrily.

"Yeah..." Jaden muttered, pulling a door open. "You can take your time in here."

"So kind of you," Matty muttered, looking at his reflection in the mirror.

"Don't be an ass," Jaden snapped. "You don't have any reason to be nice to all of us, I get that...but you don't have to try to make it difficult...I'm _trying_ to help you."

"Sorry," Matty mumbled, turning the hot water on. "But I'm sure you can accept that I meant to be _with_ my boyfriend by now."

"Oh?"

"Yeah...was going to take me to a nice dinner," Matty glanced at the guy in the reflection, smiling slightly. "Was gonna be our first real date."

"Ooh," Jaden flinched appreciatively. "That does suck."

"Suck...yeah," Matty laughed almost scathingly as he started rinsing his face off.

Jaden didn't say anything for a moment. He shook his head, though. "I've gotta piss...can I trust you not to run off?"

"And go where?" Matty retorted. "I have no idea where we are in this building...which means you'll all catch me...and probably leave me with Ranger," he shuddered at the notion.

Jaden made a vaguely amused noise and a face at that, then turned toward the urinals.

Matty shook his head, and went back to cleaning up his face.

- -

"It's off," Heero noted, still pacing. "Colonel Fucked took it...and it's off. He did it himself."

"Is he okay, you think?" Duo muttered, looking over Heero's shoulder at his screen.

"I hope so," Heero returned, staring at the name a long moment. "If not, I'm gonna have to go into hiding for what I'm gonna do."

Duo licked his lips, then moved back to the entrance of the room they were in. Quatre had taken control of the ship. It hadn't been hard, the pilot and co-pilot recognized them and had protested that their only goods were food-stuffs to be delivered on behalf of the prisoners. Quatre had pointed-out that they had no intentions of interfering with that, and the man had no further protests. Wufei and Trowa were securing the strapping to the large crate they were all going to be hanging onto to reach the colony's outer-wall.

"There," Duo muttered, moving back to his laptop. "You were right. A.C. 198, A0227 walls off port." He sat down in front of the thing, tucking his shirt down to start pulling his spacesuit up over his arms. He'd slid into the leggings, and'd had the arms tied around his waist. "I was getting worried, there...we could climb around the outer-shell like spiders until we found a vent...but being stuck there until another ship came close didn't sound appealing."

"Especially with only ninety minutes of oxygen," Heero agreed, grinning slightly, lowering his phone and moving to his own space suit. He licked his lips, glancing at his friend. "When...when you get mad...you don't stay mad, right?"

"What do you mean?" Duo asked, meeting his eyes.

"When I first saw the bruises on him on that camera-shot," Heero explained. "It made me _pissed_...I felt hot all over...that goes away, doesn't it?"

"It can...to an extent...depending on the situation."

"So...I still feel hot like that," Heero muttered, shifting slightly where he stood. "That's normal?"

"They have your boyfriend and we haven't been able to see him on the live feed for a half hour at least," Duo shrugged. "It's making me hot around the collar and I haven't even bedded him yet."

"Yet?" Heero asked sharply, meeting his eyes.

Duo gave him a look. "Let me know if you don't think you can control yourself, though."

Heero considered that a long moment. "Why?"

"So I can control you," Duo gave him another look and focused back on the computer screen. "Look, he's coming in a different door."

Heero darted forward, maximizing the screen that was rolling the video of the prisoners. Matty looked tired, and his left hand was shaking slightly.

"Knock it off," Duo snapped, minimizing the thing again. "I've got too much shit going for you to just come take over my screen...where's _your_ laptop?"

"If I turn it on I won't get anything done," Heero retorted. He knew well enough that he'd be too nervous to quit watching the video. He was able to let Duo shoo him away from _his_ machine, but if he gave in and watched his own...

"He's not bleeding, he looks okay," Duo noted reassuringly as he studied the dark-haired male. "You'll have to ask him where they took him, though."

"We got'em secured," Wufei noted, moving into the room and pulling his helmet off. "Trowa's getting our new oxygen tanks...Quatre said it should be another ten minutes before we hit the line. He's not sure how long it'll take to negotiate the crate inside, though. This wasn't something they asked for."

"But it is standard procedure," Duo muttered, looking back between them. "Their ship is still docked, right?"

"Should be," Heero returned. "If not we're going to make it a real war," he looked back to his phone and the note that said Matty's was turned off.

"What's up?" Wufei muttered. "You need to get your suit on, Yuy. It is standard, so things may start moving damn fast."

Duo looked back to the feed, noting that some of the men were starting to move around. "Looks like we've been spotted," he noted, rising to his feet. "Let's finish getting suited up...remember, Yuy, tell me if you don't think you can control yourself."

"Right," Heero agreed, dropping onto the bench to slide his feet into the bottom of his suit. He pulled it carefully on and tucked his phone into his pocket.

"I'm gonna go make sure Quatre's ready," Wufei muttered, messing with the end of his hair a moment.

"Shit," Duo muttered irritably, grabbing his braid and looking around. "Shit..."

"What?" Heero asked, zipping up his own suit to the waist.

"I didn't tuck my hair in," Duo explained in exasperation. He sighed after a moment, then moved over to the desk he'd been occupying and pulled out a pair of scissors. "Hey, look...a genuine need to hurry and a pair of scissors at hand." He offered them to Heero.

"Sounds like a good enough reason to me," Heero agreed, taking the things and grabbing the braid. "Short short?"

"Just up to here," Duo grabbed a bit closer to his shoulders. "Not too short, because I want to be able to pull it back still."

"Right," Heero agreed...and started to hack.

- -

"It's just a supply shuttle," Rab snapped at the men who were gathering in the corner. "Common procedure...they're going to see if we want the food and supplies they're offering."

"They think we can't handle it?" someone demanded.

Matty sighed and glanced at the camera. Even Jaden was distracted by the commotion. 'They told me if I didn't turn it off they'd take it from me,' he mouthed quickly. He wasn't sure if Max was watching or not, but he hadn't got the chance to do it before.

"We're going to accept it," Rab snapped. "We have the supplies, but if we refuse their help they'll take a hostile stance against us. You, boy," he pointed at Matty. "Come with me."

"What?" Matty asked blankly.

"Get up, let's go," Rab snapped, turning and starting away.

Evidently, however, Matty wasn't processing this command fast enough. Ranger stormed across the room and yanked him up by the scruff of his neck—which hurt—and hurled him after the other man.

"Damn it, Ranger!" Rab snapped, taking the few steps it required...and backhanding him. "That is _not_ okay!"

Ranger looked away, focusing his glower on Matty.

"You okay?" Jaden demanded, jogging across the room to join them.

"Watch out, J," Ranger growled, "you don't want to go getting too attached to the prisoners."

"Rab told me to watch him," Jaden snapped back.

"Enough," Rab cut them both off. "Let's go."

Matty glanced back at the camera nervously. A few other of the men followed them, and he wasn't sure he was okay with that, either.

"You're not in trouble," Rab added to Matty as they moved at a fast walk that nearly made him run to keep up. "Nothing bad is going to happen here...you're just going to talk for me, all right?"

"Talk for you?" Matty repeated blankly.

"Well, they're going to want to ask you some questions about our treatment...and you are the one who's been the _worst_ treated," he glared at Ranger a moment. "So I'll let you speak...we aren't so horrible, are we?"

"I'd rather he not be around when I answer that," Matty muttered, shying away from Ranger.

Ranger laughed coldly...and patted his back. Matty flinched hard under the touch, expecting pain...

"Ranger, go back to your post," Rab snapped at the guy. "You're just going to get him all shaken up again and he's only _just_ calmed down."

"Fine," Ranger snapped, glaring at Matty again, then turned and stormed back down the hall.

"You okay?" Jaden muttered to Matty.

"J, you really _do_ need to watch it," Rab noted clinically, looking back at him. "I know I told you to make sure he was okay...but there is a line."

Jaden looked away and shrugged as they entered a room.

"It's a commodity transport," a man noted from where he was sitting in front of a vid. "C.S. Timid. Its supplies from A0228. They want to know if we'll accept them."

"Main screen," Rab muttered, gesturing over his shoulder...as Matty caught sight of a very large window...and space beyond it.

There were so many stars...

He moved toward the thing quietly, realizing vaguely that this glass was all that separated them from a vacuum.

"C.S. Timid?" Rab asked.

Matty glanced back as an older looking man appeared on the screen.

"This is the C.S. Timid...visual recognized," he added off to the side.

"I understand you have supplies for me?" Rab asked curiously.

"If, as you have said, you're following the conventions."

"To the letter," Rab agreed, then turned and gestured at Matty. "Mr. Williams?"

Matty jumped slightly, pulling his eyes away from the window.

"Come on," Jaden muttered, indicating the man with his head pointedly.

"Oh...sorry," Matty turned and moved back to them, studying the man on the screen.

"State your name," the man muttered.

"Mattox Williams," Matty returned.

"You are a prisoner?"

"Yes..."

"According to the summation of the conventions of war," the man said evenly, "your host has to stick to certain guidelines of humanitarian conduct. The code includes a stricture on violence, a refusal of humiliation, and a steady supply of food, water, and medication to fit the needs of the prisoners. Can you verify your conditions?"

"How do you mean?" Matty asked nervously.

"Have you had supper?"

"We ate, yeah...they had a buffet," Matty shifted slightly uncomfortably. Everyone in the room was watching him.

"And water?"

"There's a flat of bottles...they let everyone grab them."

"How about sanitation?"

"I was taken to the bathroom," Matty noted. "I guess you just have to say...they haven't explained that."

The man looked to Rab.

Rab blinked back at the screen, then looked around to another man. "Make the announcement...my apologies...and I'll apologize myself. I hadn't thought to clarify this. The bathrooms are down the hall from the room they're in. It was an oversight and I'm seeing to it."

"Treatment?" the man asked, looking pointedly at Matty's chin.

Matty shifted uncertainly.

"We have several Specials in our group," Rab noted, then indicated Matty. "The boy was being argumentative about his phone."

"Any misused or broken equipment will be replaced or aptly paid for," the man noted to him pointedly.

"I have pax-pro on my phone...and I don't know how to use it," Matty muttered, looking down.

"And this was stated and understood?" the pilot demanded.

"Unfortunately," Rab muttered smoothly, "the boy has an attitude...and Ranger took this to mean he was lying. Without being able to..."

"A civilian is not required to do anything with his or her own personal materials...aside from temporary seizure."

"To watch the integrity of our..."

"What manner of treatment were you put through?" the man asked Matty through gritted teeth.

Matty glanced at Rab a moment, then shifted and licked his lips. "Ranger...hit me a few times...and..."

"You were off camera for more than thirty minutes," the man noted, looking away from his camera briefly. "You were shown off camera for more than thirty minutes."

"He...hurt my arm," Matty noted, raising his left arm to show it. "He really didn't believe me and was trying to make me add them."

The man's eyes narrowed.

"The situation went beyond my approval," Rab snapped quickly. "I intend to reprimand Ranger fully for the over reaction. The boy has been assigned an escort," he indicated Jaden. "We're seeing to it that nothing more comes of these instances. Unfortunately, we had to make him turn the phone off."

"Matt?" the man asked, looking back to him.

Matty nodded questioningly.

"Is there a similar treatment going on with any other?"

"Not to my knowledge," Matty returned, shifting again. "Everyone seems okay."

"And you're not being kept from the others?"

"Not anymore."

"This information is marked as a minor infringement on the summation of the conventions," the man noted. "But not enough to require immediate action on our part. Mr. Wire," the man called back behind him. "Ready the cargo for shipment."

"Yes, Sir," Jason returned from off screen.

Matty's heart leapt.

That _had_ been Jason, hadn't it? He'd said 'Wire'...

"Our ship will hold this position until we're sure of the cargo's delivery," the man added easily. "Please be ready to accept the shipment in a half-hour's time." He looked back to Matty. "Please be assured, Mr. Williams, that we are all intending to resolve this situation as quickly as we can manage. There should be no problem with your release."

Matty nodded.

"Please assure the other passengers," the man added. "You're not forgotten, just temporarily out of reach."

"We all have the greatest hope for the resolution," Rab noted pointedly, his tone dry.

The man nodded at Rab, then back at Matty...and the line disconnected.

Matty turned to look at Rab.

"I thought you were going to paint us as demons for sure," he noted, resting a hand briefly on Matty's shoulder. "I appreciate your honesty. You like that view?" he pointed at the window.

Matty shrugged slightly.

"Go ahead," Rab encouraged him. "Feel free to look out there...you might even see that ship launch its cargo if you look far enough to the left. I have a few things to do, then we can all go back to the rest of the guests...unless you'd like to go right away, of course."

"I'll...I'll look," Matty muttered, moving toward the window hesitantly. Jaden followed.

Had that really been Jason? Max had said he wouldn't be there more than a day, hadn't he? If he had access to whatever database the man Gene had been suggesting...it could be. But what could some commodity ship do? Why was Jason on a commodity ship? Just because Jason was there didn't mean all the others were.

What was going on?

"Look, there," Jaden had kneeled down by the edge, and pointed. "If you get down like this, you can see that ship."

Matty kneeled down himself, blinking a moment until his eyes made out those lights from the myriad stars.

"He said within a half hour," Jaden added, shifting to sit properly. "It might take them a while to do it...I don't suggest you squat like that the whole time or your legs will fall asleep."

"Yeah, huh?" Matty returned, dropping down himself and leaning forward to look out. "Which way is Earth?"

"We won't be able to see it from here," the guy noted. "It's off that way," he gestured vaguely behind.

"Oh..." Matty sighed. "I wish I stayed home."

"I bet you do," Jaden agreed in amusement. "I didn't realize how bad Ranger was being, huh? I should have stopped him before."

"If you're trying to apologize, just say the words," Matty retorted.

"Sorry," Jaden said quietly, looking around. "I'll try and keep Ranger away, but he's the only one who can make you cooperate anymore."

Matty met his eyes very pointedly. "I can _not_ add people to my machine. I don't know the settings, I don't know what anything actually means...and I haven't been able to figure it out. I don't care if you think I'm lying, that's the truth. I'm no damn masochist, I don't _like_ being hit, and I fail to see how it'd make me a hero to let some guy wail on me."

"Yeah, huh?" Jaden sighed, looking back out the window. "You're from Earth, huh? I've only been once."

"This is my first time to the colonies," Matty noted. "Probably my last, too."

"You won't get killed," the man snapped.

Matty focused on him in alarm.

"Oh...you meant...not...uh..." he grinned a bit. "Sorry, misunderstood you."

"Oh..." Matty blinked at him, then focused uneasily out the window.

"When I was on Earth, it stunk," the man noted after another moment. "Like...a bunch of cars when the vents on low, you know? We were in Cairo for a few days...and it was bad."

"Cairo?" Matty asked, blinking. "That's a weird place...and I suppose air pollution has gotten bad...was it cloudy?"

The guy nodded.

"Not much wind?"

Another nod.

"Yeah...you'll want to go somewhere that's not so main stream...maybe by the ocean, too. You can _smell_ it, you know?" Matty sighed, looking back to the blackness out the window. "I'm going to the ocean as soon as I can after this."

"Get your boyfriend to take you," Jaden suggested.

"Yeah, huh?" Matty grinned at that. "That's a good idea."


	10. Chapter 10

**Ten**

The dark box helped a helluva lot.

Duo kept his head turned inwards to lower the chance of light reflecting from his helmet. He and Heero were standing on the edge of the box—it was taller and wider than them—holding onto the strapping Trowa and Wufei had secured. Wufei was at the end of the box, and Quatre was with Trowa on the far side. Launching the crate from the ship with them all on it had been mildly complicated, but nothing they couldn't all handle.

The shuttle doors slid open, and Duo let go almost at the same time as Heero. The lack of anything resembling friction kept his body in motion as Heero hit the wall. Duo caught himself before he could crush his friend, then turned and grabbed Wufei...or would have. Evidently, though, Wufei had been riding underneath the thing, because he used his legs to stop his momentum before the door.

The box moved inside, and the doors slid shut as Duo looked across the opening to Quatre and Trowa. They all considered each other a moment, then Quatre shoved slightly so he sailed across the opening. Duo caught him, then Trowa, and they all waited as Wufei climbed carefully to join them, then pointed questioningly in a direction.

Duo nodded, making sure the others had hand handholds before starting to move.

He'd have loved to have some form of communication with his friends, but they had no idea how sensitive the equipment of the colony was. They were pretty sure the outside sensors were the very basic, which meant they may not be spotted—but there was also a chance that they'd get in and find a shit load of men with weapons after crossing into the sealed section.

They moved on.

The nice thing about the port having been walled off was that it would only seal if the air-seal _broke_. The thing was brittle, and there was no telling what would wreck it...or that had been the verdict. Duo was pretty sure it wouldn't be any worse off than some of the seals on some of the ships he'd ridden in. That meant it probably had years before it'd actually fail, and by that point they'd probably have gotten around to replacing it.

Like all colonies, there was a built-in emergency entrance. This was a door that was secured and air-locked but could be opened from the outside. It was a safety catch for any workers who may have fallen or gotten sucked out of the port. The port itself hadn't changed from the outside...just on the inside, and after they got into the air-sealed sections of the building they could go into the vents and go _into_ the colony.

This, of course, was completely dependent on the interior security.

They had no idea what they were really getting themselves into. Duo'd found the list of residents of the colony while he was trollin' for information—it was a list that Noin and her people had been working on. Almost all the general civilians had left the place. Everyone listed as living there was associated with veteran groups...a bunch of crazy-ass war-ricks with nothing better to do than plot an uprising...and led by none other than Rabid-Marsh.

Rabid-Marsh was a colonel who'd been discontent since the wars had been ended. He'd been one of the men who'd filed a complaint against Heero and Duo before they'd all gotten out of ranks. Rabid-Marsh was used to getting his way, and evidently had been in several fights against all the Gundam pilots. He'd lost good men to them, he'd said, and he'd thought it a crime against humanity that the five teens hadn't been dangling from the gallows for their war crimes.

Finding out that he'd defected wasn't nearly as shocking to him as it would be to others...like Noin. When Noin realized it was _him_...but she'd seen the videos. He'd been seen in the prisoner room. She knew already...at least if she recognized him she had. He hadn't at first, and neither had Heero, so maybe she wouldn't...and when they brought her the scanned list from Matty's phone...

That was sort of sad, really. Noin had called the man a friend and now he was working against her...maybe not in the worst of ways, but...

The line halted as they reached one of the moving bits of the colony. It wouldn't be hard to get across it, but they'd have to be careful not to get catapulted into deep space...and to catch the bit on the far side...and other such nonsense that they'd all done before.

Though...he didn't feel invincible anymore, and the whole notion was making him wary.

Heero climbed around Quatre and Wufei carefully, letting go of the colony as Wufei grabbed him...and shoved him.

It was one of those moments where your heart stops or starts beating so fast it feels like it stops...because he missed his first grab of the bar...and his second grab wasn't firm...Duo was about to launch after him when he finally caught the thing and stopped his motion with a jerk...and hung there a moment. Finally, he righted himself and turned to look at them with interest.

Wufei let go of the colony as Quatre moved forward and grabbed him...then shoved him. After a moment, Trowa'd tossed Quatre as well. Wufei had hooked his feet below the bar they were all clinging to and was almost standing straight-out from the colony...but that was more a reassurance, because that meant someone _would_ catch them.

Duo caught Trowa's wrist after he'd let go and shoved.

He didn't really appreciate being last, but he'd have approved less of Trowa or Quatre being after. He didn't know why he felt that way, but he knew it was truth enough.

He licked his lips as he judged the distance, then pulled one leg up to anchor his foot under the bar, aiming himself as best he could at Wufei...and pushed off.

He really liked earth...and gravity...and friction...he _really_ did. Inertia was overrated...completely.

He hit Wufei, who grinned at him—he had to grin back at that, because as freaky as it was to think about flying into outer space with nothing to save you...there was a damn thrill involved in infiltrating an enemy.

Wufei used his feet to start himself moving again, catching the bar before half-shoving Duo playfully at the colony.

Duo caught the bar and shook his head minutely as Heero jerked his head in question—were they ready? Yes, they were...time to move again.

He...didn't ever...really...want to do this again, Duo noted thoughtfully to himself. As much adrenaline was involved in infiltration, he rather liked the less bloody forms that adrenaline junkies could pursue...walking a tight-rope over the grand canyon, sky diving from the tip of the Eiffel Tower...jumping into huge holes or going to watch for volcanoes...those things didn't have men waiting for you with guns—most of the time—those things hadn't taken nearly so many lives...

It was too damn quiet...next time he decided to go on a fucking space-walk, he was bringing his meo—they were meant for men who worked in the vacuum and were space-proof. That'd _totally_ be better than considering the more...uh...he grinned to himself..._entertaining_...ways to get yourself killed. Besides, he'd lived through two wars before he was twenty. This wasn't even a war—it was just an unclassified disaster.

Ah well, as Wufei'd said...all for the love of one sweet boy...love, lust, or friendship, whatever it was.

Hell, at least they were in the L-5 cluster. Wufei'd gone willingly, almost eagerly...that counted for something...Duo just wasn't sure _what_.

- -

"You must be pretty proud of yourself."

Matty jumped at Ranger's voice over his shoulder.

"You worked a good one over on Marsh, huh?" he muttered. "Got him to believe you, have J running around hen-pecking for you...got it all figured out—but when it comes down to the wire, I'm gonna be there, and you're not going to be calling the shots."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Matty informed him, meeting his eyes.

Ranger rested his hand around Matty's arm...and was doing the squeezing thing again. "Your innocent eyes may get J, but I'm not nearly so swayed. I've dealt with more'n enough pretty boys to tell the liars from the rest."

"Ow..." Matty dropped the blanket he'd been picking up, trying to pry the man's hand away from his arm. "Ow..."

"So you just keep playing your game..."

"_Ow!_" Matty gasped, giving up as the grip tightened, pulling away and trying not to let his knees give out on him. "_Jaden!_"

Ranger's eyes narrowed sharply.

"Ranger!" Jaden shouted from across the room.

"_Damn_ it, Ranger!" another man, a guy who sounded like he had more authority. He stormed across the room and yanked hard on Ranger's arm...which pulled Matty over since Ranger wasn't ready for it and hadn't let go.

"Shit..." Jaden muttered irritably, darting around to help Matty up. "What the _fuck_, Ranger?"

The man who'd grabbed Ranger kicked the man solidly in the thigh...which made him topple over sideways before the guy focused on Matty. "You all right, kid?"

"I think so," Matty returned, rubbing at his arm.

Jaden grabbed the sleeve of his shirt and pushed it up, his eyes narrowing.

"Way to go, Range," the man snarled, turning Matty forcefully so his arm was obvious. "Way to _fucking_ go..."

"What?" Matty asked blankly, looking down to his arm...and a dark bruise that had already started forming.

...didn't that go against the conventions? Hadn't that been what Jaden had said before? No bruising...

"Palls! Trimas!" the man snapped. "Take Ranger into custody!"

"What?" Ranger demanded, jumping back to his feet and turning on the man.

"You are in direct violation of the summation of the conventions of war," the man snarled at Ranger. "You are hereby relieved of your duties in this place."

Ranger turned on Matty, who was staring back at him.

"We're going to talk to Rab now," the man added darkly, then turned to Matty. "I'm sorry, huh, kid? I should have been watching closer."

Matty nodded slightly at that, realizing his arm felt very _weak_. It was, of course, his left arm. The shaking that had finally subsided was starting again.

"Let's go," he snapped at the men who'd come up to them.

"You little _fuck_," Ranger spat at Matty.

"I didn't _do_ anything!" Matty shot back, stepping away backwards. "When did I ever do _anything!?_"

Ranger glared at him...and was shoved from the room.

"Are you okay, sweetie?" a woman muttered, moving closer to him instantly. "Are you all right?"

Matty nodded as a few of the other female prisoners moved closer as well.

"Here, dear," one of the older women muttered, leaning over to pick up his blanket. "There, huh?" she passed it to him and grabbed a pillow from the pile. "You sure you're okay?"

"I'm all right," Matty reassured her, smiling as he took the stuff. "Thank you...but I'm all right."

"That man just looked mean," the woman noted, glaring after Ranger. "Weren't you supposed to be watching for that?" she added accusingly to Jaden.

"Ma'am, I'm here to assist with control," Jaden noted pointedly. He sighed, though, and gestured with his head to Matty. The nineteen year old followed obediently to the camera...where Jaden turned him to show the bruising to the camera. "Incident one, the use of unnecessary physical coercion. Ranger has been taken into custody and has been removed from the premise. You okay?" he added to Matty.

"My arm hurts," Matty returned, rubbing at it.

Jaden gave him an amused look, then rolled his eyes. "Come on...we can find a quiet corner for you to crash in."

"Thanks," Matty returned dryly, looking to the camera again.

Was Max watching again? Was he pissed? He turned to follow Jaden back toward the main area of the room again as the guy pulled a pair of mattresses off the pile and looked to Matty.

"You're sleeping by me?" Matty asked, mildly amused by that. "It's a sleep over!" he snickered, grabbing up another blanket and pillow.

"Oh, gee, something I haven't had in twenty years."

Matty snickered more, then frowned at his arm.

"Don't worry at it, kid," the guy muttered. "Ranger won't be coming back around after that...what the hell was he even saying to you?"

"Said he'd dealt with enough pretty boys to tell the liars apart," Matty returned dryly, rubbing at the mark. "Said I have you convinced I'm innocent..."

"For some reason," Jaden noted dryly, "he has a point with that...unless you're lying to me."

Matty shook his head in negation.

Jaden rolled his eyes, then kicked the top mattress toward the wall. "Forgive me for assuming you want to sleep on the inside."

"Huh, something about some psycho trying to break my arm off," Matty agreed dryly, tossing a pillow and blanket onto the second mattress and tossing his own pillow down.

"We have sheets," the guy noted with a sigh. "You want'em?"

"I suppose," Matty agreed, looking sourly across the room at the bedding.

"I'll get it," Jaden reassured him, looking around. "Unless you want me to hang out."

"No, it's fine," Matty dropped down to sit on the mattress.

He was more than ready for bed.

- -

Rab was glaring at Ranger.

"He called him by name, Marsh...he _did_..."

"Jaden has been with him all day," Rab reminded him. "He probably noted it at some point..."

"We told him not to get involved," Ranger protested. "We told him not to commit..."

"Considering how bad you _terrified_ him when he _can't_ add people to his phone, it's kind of hard _not_ to feel for him...thanks, however. I'm glad you violated the conventions. Now we can have every nation snarling down our necks and telling us point-blank we can't make it as a unit."

"He's lying," Ranger snapped back. "I can't tell about what, but he's lying about something."

"He's _nineteen_," Rab snapped. "He probably stole his dad's dirty magazine and didn't get to put it back...or maybe he took money from his mom's wallet..."

"He said his mom is dead," Ranger noted darkly, storming off toward the window.

"Well...be that as it may," Rab muttered, following. "We're going to have to confine you."

Ranger sighed in annoyance.

"You _bruised_ him after all that _shit_ before...you _violated_ the damn conventions...I should throw you out for that."

Ranger met his eyes. "If he has his pax linked with the military database, he could have gotten Jaden's name."

"And you've been paranoid about his phone since the start," Rab retorted, gesturing at some soldiers. "He has it turned off now."

"Pax pro with a Chronus patch can be remotely activated," Ranger reminded him. "We have no way of telling _what_ he has on that phone because we can't _see_ it."

"The Chronus patch is another couple hundred dollars," Rab noted. "I don't think he's _that_ good in bed."

"I wouldn't be surprised," Ranger snapped back as he was cuffed. "If that boyfriend he keeps mentioning can drop three hundred on his phone because he didn't know what flight he was on...why not add the patch?"

"You forget you're dealing with a teenage boy who works retail on Earth," Rab noted pointedly. "What's the chances of him being with someone as paranoid as you?"

Ranger glared at him.

"Go," Rab added, gesturing the group away.

"There's _something_ about that phone!" Ranger snarled as he was pulled from the room. "You don't _understand_...I can _tell_."

"You and your space heart?" Rab snapped back in exasperation. "Spare me, Ranger. Go be paranoid in a cell for a few hours until I get the officials off my back."

Ranger tsked at him, then turned and allowed himself to be led away.

Rab rolled his eyes, running a hand through his hair.

"Hey, boss?" the guy who'd been trying to call the Preventer's office muttered. "I got'em...and they're pissed."

"Go figure," Rab retorted, gesturing at the main screen.

The poor boy had been put through far more than enough already...this was just bullshit. Damn Ranger and his random paranoia.

- -

"Here we go," Wufei muttered as he found the catch for the door, hesitating while the thing slid open and launching himself inside...and stumbling slightly as the partial-gravity took hold of him. He turned and offered his hand to Quatre, who also stumbled as he moved toward the interior door. It only took a moment for the five of them to be inside the little room, and Wufei hit the button to close the other lock.

Quatre activated the switch on the far wall, but until they were sure the port was still aerated, they weren't taking off their helmets...not to mention if they had to jump back into space because of troops.

They all had weapons in hands as they moved from the room, looking around intently...or as intently as they could through their helmets.

It looked like almost any airport or spaceport...gates to the outside, a decorated hall. The only difference was that it was entirely empty and dark. No light filtered through the inner wall.

Wufei raised his wrist to check the read-out. The watch had all sorts of gauges on it...specifically how much oxygen was around them, and how much oxygen was in the tank on his back.

He considered it a moment, then looked around at the others...and released the seal for the helmet. The oxygen flow stopped immediately, and he pulled the thing off, shaking his head slightly as he inhaled the lovely smell of canned air.

There were reasons he liked earth...and one of them definitely was the lack of killer-vacuum a bad seal away...another was the fresh breeze that never carried more than mild pollution.

Though really, the canned stuff didn't have foreign contaminants in it...it didn't clog your lungs up with black gunk.

Trowa was the next to remove his helmet, then Quatre and Heero. They hooked the things to their belts and clicked on their flashlights before looking curiously to Duo...Heero shining it helpfully on Duo's face.

Duo hesitated a moment...and pulled the helmet off.

His hair fell forward to frame his face—and it was only just longer than his chin.

"Holy shit..." Quatre muttered, staring at him.

"I'm hot, I know," Duo returned dryly, hooking his helmet to his belt. "Next question...do you have an extra hair-tie?" he extending a hand to Wufei.

Wufei grinned back at him and undid the top half of his suit. After a moment, he did manage to reach inside and work his arm back to his back pocket...pulling out his emergency tie. It always sucked when one broke. He tossed that to the American.

"Is it a good look?" Duo asked, tying his hair up much like Wufei's was.

"You know," Wufei muttered, grinning at him. "When you started wanting to learn to mediate I should have known it was just because you wanted to be like me...I'll teach you katas when we get back, huh?"

Duo flashed him a grin, fiddling with his hair a moment before tilting his head from one side to the other. "It's so _light_..."

"I swear your braid was ten pounds on its own," Heero noted in amusement. "I _imagine_ this feels lighter to you...turn it on."

"Huh?" Duo asked blankly, flicking on his flashlight to illuminate Heero's face since the guy hadn't stopped lighting up his.

"His phone...and for the sake of all that's good and holy, _add_ me to the damn administrator list."

Duo sniggered, undoing the front of his suit. "We need to find an access port," he noted, looking up and down the wall. "Whose chat doesn't have a splash?"

"Mine doesn't," Quatre noted, also starting to dig into his suit. "It just opens."

"Don't forget the user set-up in your invite," Duo suggested, turning and starting up the wall, shining his flashlight at about knee-height. "I'm half-amazed no one's waiting for us here."

"There's no light in here," Trowa reminded him. "It'll be easier to pounce us when we get _into_ the light. If they're waiting, they'll be sure to use that to their advantage."

"Cheery," Quatre muttered mildly. "Did I mention I'm going to be an uncle?"

They all looked at him.

"Fasiha," Quatre noted, blinking as he realized he _hadn't_ said...only Heero knew. "Sorry, the reasons for _not_ dying were coming to mind."

"Shit, I don't want to, that's good enough for me," Duo muttered, spotting a panel and grinning. "Success. Come on."

They moved down the hall, sliding out of their suits as they went. It only took them a moment to have their weaponry on their pants-belts instead of the suits, and they were all checking their access as they stopped by the panel.

"My secret weapon is a leatherman," Duo confided to Quatre sidelong, pulling out the swiss-army knife on steroids. He flicked open the screwdriver, kneeling down and starting to work the screws loose.

"That's all well and good," Trowa noted, "but there seems to be a key-hole."

"And my leatherman has some lock-picks," Duo cast Trowa an exasperated look. "Be ready if an alarm goes off."

"Your fancy toy doesn't have an alarm-killer?" Quatre protested.

"My fancy toy," Duo muttered, moving on to the final screw, "is a tool from the damn stone-ages. They sell them on replica sites, and no one has thought to add a skeleton key to it—I think I'll custom-order one and patent it, then mass produce it so every thief that lives can rape you rich people out of all your fancy silverware."

Quatre rolled his eyes.

"No?" Duo asked curiously. "But it could make me millions."

"You can make your own millions," Quatre retorted.

"That...is...making my own," Duo muttered, glancing at him as he pulled the metal thing off the wall. He flashed his friend a grin, then pulled a cord from his pocket and hooked it into his phone.

Wufei wasn't sure why, but the bickering helped him relax. They were about to make an assault on a militaristic colony with forty-seven hostages and more than a hundred soldiers...just the five of them.

Granted, the five of them and their Gundams had assaulted _Earth_...so in the grand scheme of things, this wasn't really out of their line.

Hell, at least they had the follow-through on their crazy. They didn't get lost halfway through it; they committed all the way, a hundred and ten percent...

Hell, what was life without a little gunfire, anyway?

_Note to self,_ he thought languidly as he watched Duo hacking into a colony system, _talk to Mike about those prescription anti-crazy drugs he was talking about...be sure he knows they should be able to stop me from __**assaulting a damn colony**__ full of discontent war-rick veterans._

Somehow, though, Wufei doubted the good doctor had anything _that_ strong in his little paper arsenal.

There were some forms of crazy that medication just _didn't_ cut it for...very few, though...very _very_ few.

- -

Matty rolled over as he felt the sensation again, blinking around the room blankly. He had no idea what time it was, but it looked like everyone was sleeping. There were a few soldiers standing against the walls...and they mostly looked asleep too.

His phone buzzed again.

Matty blinked in amazement, pressing his hand to the thing and looking nervously to Jaden. The man, though, was snoring with his head turned away.

The teen pulled his phone from his pocket, his heart hammering since he knew the light was going to be...very very dim?

Matty blinked at it.

'_Are you okay?_' Max demanded.

'_My phone was off,_' Matty noted.

'_Yes, we turned it back on. Are you safe?_'

'_My escort is sleeping right here...I don't think anyone else really realizes mine is supposed to BE off._'

'_So you're okay?_'

'_I suppose,_' Matty muttered. '_My arm hurts, though. _'

'_What happened to it?_'

'_Ranger was squeezing it,_' Matty explained, glancing nervously at Jaden again. '_They made him stop...are you watching the feed?_'

'_I haven't had access to it in a while,_' Max returned. '_Why?_'

'_Ranger freaked out on me...was telling me he could tell I was lying and then bruised me._'

'_That's a violation of..._'

'_I know...they basically arrested him for it, then Jaden took me to the camera to show it and note it._'

'_Jaden?_'

'_Um...the first guy who touched my phone,_' Matty explained. '_What's going on?_'

'_Not a whole lot...nothing for you to worry about. I take it you mean Timorre?_'

'_I think that's what it said his last name was...I think it said first lieutenant or something like that, too._'

'_Yeah...he's your escort?_'

'_Yeah...he feels bad about me missing our date...kinda fucked up that you were right, huh? You said if I came we wouldn't go._'

'_I was just being a dick,_' Max admitted. '_Are you still with the others?_'

'_Yeah...since they got me to turn my phone off they haven't been paying too much attention to me. Just when Ranger grabbed me._'

'_All right. Just keep cooperating with them, all right? We're on our way._'

'_What do you mean?_'

'_Shush. Don't ask questions. If shit happens and you get away, go into Jason's chat room, all right? We're all in it._'

Matty stared at that.

'_I'm turning your phone off now. I've got a lock on your location._'

'_What? What's going on?_' Matty couldn't help but wonder if they were _really_ coming after him now.

'_I told you, don't worry about it. Go back to sleep._'

'_Fine...I'm sorry I didn't listen to you...I,_' he hesitated a moment. '_I miss you._'

'_I miss you, too,_' Max reassured him. '_If your phone buzzes again, don't pull it out. It's just us turning it on so we can get a lock on you. You DON'T want anyone taking it from you, especially now._'

'_All right._'

'_All right,_' Max agreed. '_Be safe...and relax._'

That seemed highly unlikely, but the phone powered down silently.

He'd tried repeatedly, and he'd never been able to turn it off without the annoying good-bye tune.

He slid the thing back into his pocket, dropping back down on the mattress.

"You have to use the bathroom or something?" Jaden muttered tiredly, rolling over.

"Huh? Yeah," Matty returned, realizing that his motion had woken the other up. "Kind of...I was just having a freaky dream."

"After a day like today, I'm shocked it wasn't a full-blown nightmare," the guy yawned and sat up. "Come on."

"Yeah," Matty agreed, climbing from his bedding as well and following the other toward the door.

What the _hell_ was going on? He wished he knew.

How had they turned his phone _on_ anyway? But Max had said to turn it off if they told him to, and not to hesitate or worry about it. That explained why.

So now all he had to do was to go back to sleep. They'd found his location...what a strange thought.

He moved up to the urinal as Jaden tiredly moved to the sinks.

He was almost more curious to know what was happening than to get out of the situation—probably _because_ Jaden was...what had Ranger said? Hen-pecking? J is hen-pecking for you...Jaden was definitely seeing to it that nothing went bad for him...and that made the situation ten times more comfortable.

So...wait and relax? He _was_ tired...and he'd always been told that time moves faster when you're sleeping through it.

_Got it, Max. I'll go back to sleep._ He grinned slightly to himself as he started washing his hands.

"Hm?" Jaden asked curiously, a little confused.

"My arm doesn't ache nearly as bad as it did," Matty lied quickly...but not too quickly. He made it sound casual and believable.

"That bruise looks nasty, though," Jaden returned, leaning forward slightly to study it. "I don't know...what helps bruises go down? There's gotta be something we can do about it."

"I dunno," Matty admitted, considering the thing. "We'd have to talk to a doctor or something...and I'm not _that_ worried about it."

"But it's _our_ responsibility," Jaden reminded him. "Maybe I should call the doctor over."

"Can't we go to him? That sounds a lot less of a hassle for him...in the morning...after sleep."

Jaden snorted at that. "I was about to be impressed with how considerate you were of your captors...but you're just a lazy teenager, aren't you?"

Matty flashed him a grin and rolled his eyes. "Sure, _Dad_, if you say so."

"I could almost have a son your age," Jaden retorted, kicking almost playfully at his shin. "If I were like...fifteen when I got her pregnant."

"You're thirty-four?" Matty asked blankly, looking to him curiously.

The guy snorted at him and shoved him at the bathroom door.

"Okay, okay," Matty retorted. "I just thought you were like...twenty-eight or something."

"I think I'll take that as a compliment and remind you that it's _not_ your business."

"Sorry," Matty retorted again, though neither his words nor Jaden's were annoyed.

The man made an amused noise, and followed him back toward the main room. "I'll talk to Rab about getting you to the clinic _after_ you wake up," he noted after a moment. "But we don't really want to keep you off camera after the initial shit with Ranger."

"Oh," Matty frowned slightly and shrugged. "Whatever, as long as its not tonight."

"Lazy-ass," Jaden retorted, watching as he sat down. "Anyone else in here bother you?"

"That little old lady who keeps calling me sweetie," Matty noted, grinning slightly at that, pointing at the older woman on the far side of the room.

Jaden rolled his eyes slightly. "Then I can go for a while?"

"It's just Ranger," Matty noted, shifting uncomfortably. "Unless there are more like him in here," he looked to the men standing around the walls nervously.

"There are, but they have no reason to pay you mind, especially if you're sleeping," Jaden noted. "I need to go see if Rab's awake and talk to him about a few things. You okay here? Really?"

Matty nodded.

"Fine," the guy muttered, then wandered to the camera. Matty couldn't quite make out what he was saying, but it didn't take him long before he turned and left the room with a nod to Matty in parting.

Matty shifted back on his side, staring toward the far wall.

It was all well and good for him to be tired, and for him to want to do as Max had suggested...unfortunately, nothing in his life ever seemed _that_ easy.

One of the soldiers on the wall shifted slightly, and Matty jumped as he focused on him, then turned so his back was to the main room and let his heart re-settle...and, finally...fall back into a deep dreamless sleep.

- -

E/N: just a question after looking at the hit count...did everyone read 6?


	11. Chapter 11

**Eleven**

"Right, it's clear," Duo muttered, rejoining Trowa and Heero. "Where's Quatre and Fei?"

"Not back yet," Heero returned, shifting the emergency lamp they were using around on its shelf.

From what they'd been able to gather, the area they were in hadn't had people for years. Maintenance probably went through once in a while to check the seals, but there was dust around, which was saying something since the vents usually dealt with that sort of issue.

For the sake of prudence, however—ignoring that Wufei said she was bad in bed—they'd decided not to hang out in the middle of the hall. They'd found a utility closet that had an access port and had set up.

It was going on midnight.

Heero ran a hand down his face as Trowa and Duo muttered to each other. Matty's flight had left at what? One? Two? It must have been two. His own flight had been at three, and that had been around when Matty had been grabbed. So, not counting the flight, he'd been with those people for nine hours, and they'd hurt him. He'd said his arm hurt...Ranger had really _hurt_ his arm...

"Yo..." Duo ran a hand in front of Heero's eyes.

Heero jumped and smacked at him.

Duo snickered wickedly.

"You okay?" Trowa asked curiously, studying his face. "You still with us?"

"What?" Heero retorted, looking between them.

"I asked if you thought we should get the shuttle for Quatre and leave him to guard it or just go after the prisoners," Duo returned, studying his eyes. "Where were you?"

"He's been in there for nine hours," Heero returned a bit uncomfortably, not entirely sure what had happened. He'd heard them talking, but their words hadn't made sense, he wasn't listening to what they were saying—he'd been thinking.

He should ask Duo about that some other time.

"Oh," Duo nodded his agreement. "I get ya...worried?"

"I guess," Heero returned, studying Trowa's face a moment. "I just can't stop thinking about him."

Duo nodded again, glancing at Trowa.

"Hey," Wufei muttered, ducking into the room. "I got the alarms disconnected from the doors. We'll be able to get in and out without a fuss," he kneeled down and looked between them all. "Where's Quatre?"

"He hasn't come back yet," Duo returned.

"Should we go for him?" Wufei demanded.

"Since I'm such a pussy?" Quatre snapped, sliding into the room as well. "Kiss my ass, Fian."

"Fian," Wufei rolled his eyes. "What's the verdict?"

"About what I expected," Quatre returned. "After you guys start making noise by that armory, a few of them should vacate the premise and leave a streak a mile wide for me to work with."

"Could you see if it'd been refueled or not?" Heero muttered, meeting his eyes. "The oxygen?"

"There's fuel enough," Quatre reassured him. "They overfill it for a round trip and it only made half that. I imagine the oxygen levels are fine, but even if they aren't, there are suits enough on there and oxygen enough...shit, even if there's not enough to get all the way back, as long as we don't hit anything we can make it back to 25."

"Synch watches, and break!" Wufei muttered, pretending to dart for the exit.

"Do you have watch?" Heero asked him blankly.

"Uh...no," Wufei returned. "Neither do you...or you," he indicated Duo.

"I use my phone," Quatre agreed in amusement.

"So, I'm taking it that it's a no on us-getting the port for you," Duo noted to the blond.

"That's a _hell_ no," Quatre retorted. "If you do that, they'll know exactly what we're doing. When shit starts going they'll probably think we got someone over here waiting for us all...and even if they do add a lot more, I can hold the ship and keep it in dock until you come...and you guys can burn your own trail to get in. I'm _hoping_ that you'll be making so much noise there that they forget about the partially fueled shuttle they left behind...and that _is_ a hint, gentlemen."

"So, smoke and mirrors," Trowa noted considerately, stroking his chin.

Quatre gave him a look.

Trowa looked back, then looked to the rest.

"I didn't see anyone waiting over there," Duo noted, jerking his head toward the colony-side of the port-wall. "I climbed up through the vents and things and didn't see anyone."

"Good," Heero muttered. "I had the same notion."

"I saw some cars going by," Trowa noted. "So we'll definitely want to stay by the wall."

"You find any proximity monitors?" Heero muttered to Duo.

"I didn't pick up on any, but my phone isn't as sensitive as my laptop. We'll need to be careful when we get there."

"I can get to the port through this," Quatre noted, gesturing down the hall. "I got up into the vents. I'll get up there again and wait for your noise, then go down quiet-like and clean up. I'll start the air tanks loading while I wait...but we can't take long on this. You know that, right? We get as many as we can and get out."

"That defeats the purpose of us coming at all," Heero retorted. "They want a war, we'll bring it to'em, and they can decide if this game of independence is really worth it in the long run."

"They're committed now," Quatre noted. "They took the hostages and contacted the governments...if their claim falls short, they get struck with the 'terrorist' name-tag and tried as instigators of violence. Rabid-Marsh'd get ten to life on that alone."

"I guess they all call him Rab now," Heero noted, thinking back to Matty and how well he was really dealing with all the shit going on. "You think he managed to get back to sleep?"

"I really want to ask you, 'who, Marsh?' but I think you'd hit me for that," Wufei noted, grinning.

Heero gave him a look.

"So," Wufei swept on happily, bouncing slightly. "When do we start?"

"It's late," Duo noted, looking to his phone. "We've had a long day and the prisoners will all be sleeping. I say we give it until five and start finishing our plans. Arguments?"

"That works," Heero muttered, shifting slightly. "I want to go now, but I know that's impatience."

"How's the anger?" Duo asked.

"I think I'm okay," Heero returned, shifting again. "Just watch me as we go in closer."

"Right," Duo agreed. "So who takes first watch?"

"I will," Quatre returned. "I'll leave it cracked and keep an eye out. If anyone comes just try to close it as much as you can. Unless they know we're here, they shouldn't notice at all."

They all nodded at that, situating around. The closet was big enough for them to lay straight in, with their heads under the lowest level of shelves. It wasn't exactly the most comfortable, but in their situation, it was probably the safest.

- -

"Hey, Williams...hey..."

Matty opened his eyes tiredly, blinking up at Jaden.

"You awake?" the man asked, considering him skeptically.

"You woke me up, what do you think?" Matty retorted, draping an arm over his eyes.

"Come on...we're gonna hit the clinic," Jaden kicked him lightly with the side of his boot.

"Huh? Oh...oh, all right," Matty sat up and yawned, covering his mouth. "I have to pee again...and my mouth is gross," he made a face as he realized he hadn't brushed before bed.

"Go grab a toothbrush, then," the man pointed across the room at one of the bins the soldiers had set up.

Matty blinked at that as he climbed up, realizing something was different about the man. He'd been grabbing things _for_ Matty before they went to bed.

"Go say in the camera what's going on, too," Jaden suggested. "I'll wait by the door."

Matty frowned at him, wondering what had happened. He grabbed a toothbrush and some toothpaste from the bins, then considered the other stuff in it. There were bottles of soap and deodorants and things. That meant there were probably showers, too. That'd be nice.

Tell the camera?

He moved up to the thing and hesitated. "Uh...we're going to the clinic to get this looked at," he noted, indicating his bruise. "I'm gonna brush my teeth and stuff first...and then we'll be back." He hesitated again, then turned and headed for Jaden and the door.

The walk was quiet and brisk. Matty nearly had to run again to keep up. "Hey...hey," he muttered, grabbing the guy's arm. "Can't we slow down?"

Jaden sighed and gave him a look, stopping obligingly a moment.

"What? What did I do?" Matty demanded, fidgeting slightly.

"Rab was annoyed at me for being so friendly with you," Jaden retorted. "Said I was taking it too far."

"Oh," Matty receded slightly, starting to walk and hesitating again. "I'm sorry."

Jaden grinned slightly at that and shook his head. "You're gonna get me in a world of hurt, kid. Let's go."

"I'm not _trying_ to," Matty protested.

"You're doing exactly what you're supposed to be doing. Supposing this all went to deep-nine shit, I couldn't let you get hurt or killed...which may not bother you in the slightest, but it puts me at a disadvantage."

"I'm sorry for _trusting_ you," Matty retorted, frowning at him. That 'deep-nine shit' comment put him in mind of Max saying he was coming in to save him.

"When did I tell you my _name?_" Jaden demanded, turning to meet his eyes. "I don't remember telling you my name, but Ranger and a few others said you called it."

...from my phone.

Shit.

Matty blinked at him, then thought a second. "We were talking," he adlibbed, trying to think of a sufficiently random moment of conversation. "I don't remember now..." because there _was_ no moment he could have gotten that information and really forgotten.

The guy frowned. "I really thought I hadn't said anything to you."

"I think of you...as Jaden," Matty noted thoughtfully. "Maybe...maybe someone else said it?"

"Most people just call me J," Jaden returned frowning.

"I don't know," Matty muttered, frowning more. "I don't remember...it's just..."

"Hm," Jaden returned. "I guess maybe someone did..."

"I dunno...I'm not trying to...to..."

"That's sort of the point," Jaden retorted dryly. "You're doing exactly what you're supposed to be doing, and I'm doing what I'm _not_ supposed to be doing."

"I'll stand up for you," Matty offered. "If...if it goes to deep-nine."

"I appreciate that, kid," Jaden retorted dryly. "Unfortunately, if I don't back off, Rab said he'd get someone else to sit with you. I told him to do what he thought was best...because if I'd argued he'd have done it anyway."

"I appreciate that," Matty muttered, looking up to his face from the corner of his eye.

"Of course you do," Jaden retorted. "I did it all without even thinking about it, too...which scares me. I thought I could do this. Maybe we should talk about _me_ for a while."

"My boyfriend might get jealous," Matty noted, grinning slightly.

Jaden gave him a level look.

Matty snickered and shrugged slightly.

"Don't take it personal, huh?" Jaden added after a minute. "I have to back off. I'm amazed I was let to do this without anyone around," he gestured around them.

Matty nodded. "I guess I get it...but you're still in charge, you know? I'll do what you say."

Jaden looked sidelong at him a long moment, then nodded.

Matty hesitated, looking around blankly.

"Hm?" Jaden muttered.

"What _time_ is it?"

Jaden grinned at him slightly, shaking his head. "It's six. I know it's early, but the doctor said we should get right on it."

"Right," Matty muttered, rubbing at his eyes as he looked around. "Right..."

- -

"He's going to the clinic," Heero muttered blankly.

Duo roused himself and looked around to the guy, then blinked at the phone he was holding up.

"Way to be subtle, Yuy," Wufei grumped. "The only light up and down the isle at all is your phone."

"It's a hallway...and no one comes back here," Heero shook his head slightly, looking around. "Where is this clinic?"

"I'll look up the floor plan in just a minute," Duo returned, rubbing his eyes and running his hand through his hair...and stopping as the length-change meant the hair was no longer in his hands. "Shit..."

"Huh?" Heero looked back to him in confusion.

"I forgot I had you hack it off," Duo explained, sitting up and shaking his head to test the weight difference again.

"Oh...you awake, Quatre?"

"Yeah," Quatre muttered, still not moving. "I'm just thinking that we're about to go do a head-on assault...there are five of us and a full colony of them."

"It hardly seems fair," Wufei agreed. "They won't have any idea what hit them."

Quatre chuckled darkly.

"We are nuts, aren't we?" Trowa muttered through a yawn. "Doesn't matter—it's not exactly a fight to win. We just gotta get forty-seven and get out. Have you been watching that feed all morning?"

"I turned it on and had the screen dark with a ear-bud in," Heero returned, rubbing his eyes.

"Hey...I should have had two watches," Quatre muttered, sitting up to look at Heero as best he could with half his body under a shelf.

"I couldn't get back to sleep right now if I were drugged," Heero retorted. "I'm way too wired."

Quatre made an annoyed sort of noise.

"It's not a dig at you," Duo reminded the blond. "Matty's _in_ there somewhere."

"I know...but you guys always cater to me, it's annoying."

"Think of it as respect and get over it," Trowa suggested, sitting up as well. "How do you know he's going to the clinic?"

"A couple minutes ago," Heero explained, "I heard Timorre talking...to Matty. Matty wandered around a minute, then came up to the camera and said they were going to the clinic to get his bruise looked at."

"At least they're responsible," Quatre noted dryly. "So, Duo...you got that handy-dandy map?"

"Handy-dandy?" Duo echoed blankly.

"Oh shut-up," Quatre retorted.

"I'll look," Duo agreed, raising his phone. The light of the screen illuminated the full closet, and they all sat there looking at each other as they waited.

"There," Duo muttered, tapping something.

Heero's phone beeped. Heero accepted the file, and watched as a black-and-white map unfolded across the screen. Finally, it showed a highlighted area. He zoomed that out some to get the path he'd need.

There was no doubt in anyone's mind that he was going after Matty. As soon as the guy had left, the plan had changed. It would have been easier to get the full herd onto the ship at one time, but if it was just him and Matty...well, worse came to worse they could go into the old port again, get the suits, and launch into the great-black yonder. He was pretty sure he could aim them for the next colony over; it was just a question of if they'd get picked up in time or run out of oxygen.

"So, I want you to make a _lot_ of noise," Quatre muttered, running his hands through his hair. "It will be easier to take and hold the ship if there's only ten guys left to guard it, you know? And that way when you get all the hostages there, there will be less chance of them getting shot on the load. Yuy, you need to be _fast_. As fast as you can make it. We'll need you to clear our path or cover our retreat, you got that?"

Heero nodded.

"You three, be damn careful," Quatre admonished the others. "No stupid risks, no last stands. You need to get in, get the forty-six, and get out. What we're doing is heroic enough for the history books, don't stand back to play more'n that. Got it?"

"Right," Trowa muttered as Wufei nodded.

"Duo?" Quatre asked.

"I'm just trying to think of the best way to get a _lot_ of attention without being overly heroic," the American noted dryly. "If I stay behind to play distraction, you gonna skin me?"

"If _you_ get caught," Quatre retorted, "they aren't going to assign _you_ an escort."

"Shit, I can play hide'n'seek when I got a half-full colony as my playground. I don't know about you lot, but I know Yuy'll come back for me after he gets the boy clear."

"_Don't_ play the hero," Quatre snapped.

"Yeah, that's Heero's job," Wufei purred, rolling the r a few more times than normal.

Heero flashed him a grin. He liked it when they said his name like that...it sounded suggestive, and the only people who did it were them, so it was also a familiar thing.

"Right..." Quatre muttered, rubbing his temples. "I don't know what else to say here..."

"Kick ass and take names?" Wufei asked curiously. "Or maybe kick ass and forget names? If I see a hot chick, can I get _her_ name? I love a woman in uniform with a deadly weapon...turns me on."

Duo snorted at that.

"Yeah...get her name and number, make a date," Quatre retorted. "Just don't expect us to come bail you out when your booty-call turns into a trap."

Wufei laughed wickedly.

"Did you _honestly_ just say 'booty-call', Quatre? _Really?_" Trowa demanded in a level tone.

Quatre sniggered, flashing them all a grin, then rose to his feet to stretch. "No time like the present to win the heart of a boy," he noted.

"He's mine, and you can't have him," Heero retorted happily. Duo might trip him up when it came to comments like that, but he knew for a _fact_ that Quatre was kidding.

Quatre sniggered.

"Right...one two three, break," Duo muttered, rising and stretching as well. "How about coffee first?"

They all exchanged amused grins, then looked down to Trowa.

"Okay, okay," Trowa muttered. "Nothing like the promise of adrenaline to get you up and moving before dawn..."

"We're on a colony," Duo noted dryly. "They don't exactly _have_ a dawn."

- -

"It's a fine bruise," the doctor muttered, running his fingers gently over it. "And you can feel the tissue is tender," he ran his fingers along Matty's arm. "But there's nothing I can really do to help...I suppose I can give you an analgesic cream...if it hurts too much."

"I should be okay," Matty returned.

"Hm...I'll let you think about that seriously...talk it over with, uh, J," he nodded his head at Jaden. "I'll go access your medical records."

Matty blinked after the guy in confusion.

"You should take the cream," Jaden noted seriously. "It's a visual aid. You got hurt and we got you medicine. We're good people and an accident happened."

"I don't care to have pain-relieving _cream_," Matty retorted, giving him a look. "Besides, those things always stink and it stays _with_ you."

"Don't argue with me like that," Jaden retorted. "I'm in enough shit without you egging it on. Just take the cream and use it once or twice. No harm, no foul."

"You making me use something will just tell my family that I'm under duress or something," he retorted. "My dad knows I wouldn't get a cream for something like this," he moved his arm. "They'll know it's just you making the motions."

"The motions are nice things that put us all where we want to be," Jaden retorted. "Don't be obnoxious just because you think you can get away with it."

"Well, according to my sister," Matty retorted, "it's a consistent character defect. Don't think you're special because I'm an ass."

Jaden snorted at that, though he hadn't changed his position in the slightest. He was rather comfortably draped across the chair.

"I'll tell the camera that I decided not to take it," Matty noted. "I'll explain that it's stupid to use a cream like that and that you guys offered it...motion motion, right?"

"I think you should take the cream," he retorted.

Matty opened his mouth to retort to that...but there was a loud noise outside the building...an explosion that seemed to make the whole building vibrate.

Jaden jumped to his feet.

Something else exploded...and a whirring noise started somewhere a ways off.

There was another explosion.

"What is that?" Matty demanded, panic grabbing his soul as his whole idea of the space-vacuum around them took hold.

"I don't know," Jaden muttered...as a siren screamed shrilly to life. He stared at the flashing red light that lit up the room and pulled his firearm.

"What are you doing?" Matty squeaked, staring at the thing in dismay.

"Hush," Jaden ordered, looking over his shoulder at the teen a moment, then moving to stick his head out the door...as the metal doors down the hall started closing with a loud _shunk, shunk_...

"What is that?" Matty squeaked, moving forward more. "That's not...it's not going to close us _in_ is it?" he started to dart for the door.

"I don't know what's going on," Jaden snapped, not letting him pass. The door to their room started to slide close, and he extending his right foot to stop it—which made it slide slowly back open. "It won't lock us in, calm down..."

Matty shied back slightly, noticing the gun again.

There was another explosion.

The whirring sound intensified, a fan slowly speeding up.

"What is _that?_" Matty demanded, raising his voice to be sure he was _heard_ over the thing.

"There's fire," Jaden noted, gesturing him back. "Stay here...I'm going to check this out."

"_Jaden!_" Matty protested, darting after the man. He didn't want to be left _behind_...

"You're maddening," the man snapped as they reached the main doors, shoving him to the ground by a wall and gesturing with his free hand for him to stay. They were at an entrance to the clinic that didn't have a lobby, and the noise of the siren and the fan was blocking out all but distant shouts.

Jaden moved out the front doors of the building, looking around the sky carefully, then hesitated and pulled a radio from his pocket and put it to his mouth. He nodded a few times, then said something else and darted back to the building.

"What's going on?" Matty demanded.

"An attack," Jaden retorted, grabbing him up from the ground by his right arm and shoving him forward. "Not sure who it is, though...they're exploding things, which can be _damn_ dangerous with this much oxygen around."

"An attack?" Matty demanded...Max _had_ said he wouldn't be there a full day. Assuming he meant twenty-four hours...

"Get in here," Jaden snapped, tossing back into the exam room. "Get by that corner and stay on the ground," he gestured.

Matty sank down by the end of the exam-bed, looking around wildly. The corner the man had suggested was a long way away from the man himself, and that idea didn't work for Matty's thought-processings.

"Here," the doctor half-shouted, tossing a tube at Matty. "Don't ingest it and rub it in...I have to go," he added to Jaden. "Be careful, Timorre."

Jaden nodded, and the doctor turned to dart away.

Matty tucked the tube into his pocket, biting his lip. "Shouldn't you get away from the door?" he demanded.

"That's an excellent idea," Jaden retorted. "I'll just let them come take you, shall I?"

"But they could shoot you..." Matty protested, moving closer to his legs.

The man looked back to him sharply, then narrowed his eyes as he thought. "Let's get back closer to the main base," he suggested...as another explosion rocked the area around them.

That was severely alarming.

"On your feet!" Jaden snapped, yanking him up. "Let's go!"

Matty had no intentions of arguing.

- -

Duo grinned slightly as he darted around another corner, amused by the water spraying around them as the siren screamed its useless warning and the colony fan worked to suck the smoke away from the civilians.

"Think that's enough smoke for'im?" Duo shouted to Trowa.

"Yeah," Trowa shouted back in amusement. "Now for the mirrors!" He stepped forward a few steps and aimed out one of the glass doors toward a tank-type machine outside...and shot. It took three shots...before _that_ exploded, too.

Duo laughed wickedly.

"Clear!" Wufei snapped, darting forward.

Duo and Trowa followed instantly, hearing the men who were looking for them moving up behind. They hadn't been spotted yet, so no one would realize it was just three lone war-rick ex-pilots...and that was better. If they could draw all eyes toward themselves, that'd give both Heero _and_ Quatre time to work with minimal interruptions.

"Down," Wufei hissed, gesturing them back as he studied the path they were taking. He had the layout of the place memorized, or at least their path. "Someone's coming. Do we engage?"

"We don't want them knowing our numbers yet," Duo reminded him. "We need somewhere to go...and we need to make more noise."

"Another car?" Trowa asked, flashing them a wicked grin as he looked toward the outside.

"No, we need it somewhere else," Duo returned, looking around behind them. "What could we blow up back here?"

"I wish we could have found an old abandoned armory that was still set up," Trowa said half-longingly. "We could use some flash bombs and shit right about now."

"So...let's not blow an oxygen tank," Duo noted to the man. "People are still going to be living when we leave here."

Trowa grinned that same wicked grin.

"Well, think of something," Wufei snapped, looking around. "I rather liked the exploding cars."

"But that gives them a path they can predict," Trowa reminded him.

"So get one further in the street," Wufei pointed. "There are some parked on the far side."

"Right," Duo agreed, looking around. "Let's go."

- -

Quatre grinned as the siren shrilled into life around him, watching as the soldiers who'd been standing around uncertainly made their decisions. As he'd hoped, most of them ran off.

"We could be under attack here!" someone was shouting irritably. "They could come here! You know!? _Fueled_ shuttle!?" he gestured at the machine.

No one was listening to him, though. He was making useless noise to add to the din. The colony fan was loud enough on its own, not to mention the siren...and now shouting.

Something else exploded, and whether they wanted to rubberneck or help out fellow comrades, Quatre couldn't tell. All but the most paranoid left the flight.

It worked out to be about as much as he'd hoped.

He grinned and moved through the vent, dropping to his feet and looking around. It'd be about thirty seconds before anyone noticed him—he intended to use that advantage to find out where _everyone_ was hiding.

"Hey!" someone shouted, turning on him with his weapon.

"Don't point that at me," Quatre warned, he didn't have to make an effort to aim, but the man didn't know that.

"Who are you?" the man shouted back. "Where are you from?"

"Let's say blue-deck twelve," Quatre offered, moving forward casually.

"There is no blue deck," the man returned, narrowing his eyes.

"Dang...maroon? Beige?" he held his hands up to show they were empty—he had his rifle around his neck. "I know! Mauve!"

The man raised his weapon.

Quatre shot him, felling him instantly. He'd been the one ranting about the fueled shuttle. The other soldiers who were there stared in shock...and started shooting.

The blond didn't feel particularly homicidal, and even though he could have killed the ten or fifteen men in one shot, he opted for the more humane form of severe-injury. More humane in that they'd survive with minimal crippling...if any.

...but then again, he couldn't let them all just lay there and bleed out.

He cursed himself mentally, darting into the shuttle—the port was beyond clear—and started the oxygen tank filling before grabbing a medical kit and darting back out to the main area.

He could take care of as many as he could before the others showed up...and get them out of the path that would be trampled. If it came down to it and he got caught, he'd gain brownie points as a humanitarian.

He set to work.


	12. Chapter 12

**Twelve**

"I think it's someone coming after you lot," Jaden hissed, shoving Matty into another random room. They'd been ducking into them from time to time. Jaden was looking around as he did shoved the teen in, making sure it was safe...there'd been an explosion close-by, and Jaden wanted to be sure he wasn't taking one of the prisoners into a fire-fight. "I think they sent troops," he added tightly.

"How would they get in?" Matty asked blankly.

"I have no clue," Jaden returned. "Hush."

Matty licked his lips and shifted back, keeping as out of sight as he could, and quiet.

Jaden looked the hall over a moment, then moved back in and squatted down in front of the teen...then glanced down.

Matty was wearing a pair of cargo-jeans, and his phone was in the lower right pocket. He didn't understand why that was interesting, though.

Jaden's hand snaked into his pocket...and pulled out his phone.

"Hey!" Matty protested the violation of his personal space...then realized the phone was _on_.

"When did you turn this on?" Jaden hissed, his expression becoming angry.

"I didn..." Matty started, then realized that it meant Max was looking for him. They met eyes.

"You little _bastard!_" Jaden snarled...and backhanded him.

The pain was a shock, and the fact that it _was_ Jaden was even more so.

Matty pressed a shaking hand to his face, then looked down at it as he saw blood again...his nose or his lip, he couldn't tell which.

"How could you do this to me?" Jaden snarled more, his tone low and intense. "I put my ass on the line for you and you do this?"

"I didn't do it," Matty muttered helplessly, tasting the blood and wiping at his face again.

Jaden glared down at him and threw the phone at his stomach. "You better stay right here, or so help me, I'll shoot you."

Matty blinked up at him in confusion.

Jaden turned on him toward the doors, then moved across the room to kick a metal table over. His expression was dark as he slid the table in front of Matty, then glared at the teen again.

"I didn't turn it on," Matty muttered again, leaning against that protection.

"Yeah, I believe you," Jaden snarled. "Pax-pro with the Chronus patch. Very clever," he shook his head in disgust.

"With what?" Matty asked blankly.

"Oh, don't play me anymore," Jaden snapped. "Who were you talking to? Who put that on your phone? Do we have a leak?"

"What?" Matty asked again, realizing his hand was covered in blood.

Jaden turned a severely cold glare on him.

"I told you...it's my boyfriend," Matty muttered, wiping the liquid onto his pants again as he swallowed. "I don't know about any leak or..."

"Ranger was right," Jaden noted, glaring down at Matty again. "You're just some little fuckin' pretty boy, bat your eyes to get your way..."

"What?" Matty protested, hurt by that. "I don't...I'm not..."

"Shut-up," Jaden snarled. "Or I'll hit you again."

- -

Ranger sneered slightly at his reflection in a passing window, listening intently as he moved. As soon as the first explosion had hit, his restrictions had been lifted. He, like many others, had ran directly for the explosions and fires...but unlike everyone else, he'd decided to take one of the paths that _wasn't_ directly up the road.

He'd known something was up. That boy had something connected to him, but Ranger didn't know beyond that. He doubted the kid was a spy, but with the phone the way it had been, there wasn't much more that it _could_ be.

If he did find out it was that damn brat, he was going to _really_ hurt the kid...conventions or no.

- -

"Don't play hero!" Wufei snarled at Duo.

"Clear the damn path to the room," Duo snarled back at him.

They needed to alter their line of travel, or at least make it look altered. They'd managed to keep out of sight of the myriad soldiers running around, but that wasn't going to happen if they kept to the straight and narrow.

"Go," Trowa snapped, looking around. "While it's clear."

Duo nodded once at him as he also looked around, then darted across the way. He was going to shoot up a few more cars on the roadway. The full ones made lovely explodey-noises when the fire got to them, and that was a nice distraction—away from Quatre _and_ Heero, wherever they were.

He darted across the street, noting men further down and raising his eyes to the other side of the ceiling.

It was harder to do the pray thing when not looking at an endless blue expanse. Almost made it silly to even think about...but then again, there was no such thing as an atheist in a foxhole.

He licked his lips, and took his aim.

- -

"I don't _care!_ Just _find_ them!" Rab snarled at the man who was reporting about the security not being breached anywhere at all. People were running all over as a few men on the computers ran scans on the positions of the radios. That would activate a signal that needed response before it'd turn back off. That would tell them which of their men were...dead.

That thought touched a nerve, and Rab started snarling as he looked around the walls at the useless equipment.

What was the _point_ if it didn't _warn_ of intruders?

- -

Heero snarled as he moved into a silent hall, stopping to look at the face of his phone again.

There...that room...

He looked up the hall at a cracked doorway. He couldn't see anyone in it, but that was where Matty's phone was, and it claimed to still be in Matty's possession.

He moved silently up the hall, listening as a man ran by on the road outside.

Duo and the others were doing a damn good job at making a lot of smoke. If he hadn't known it was just the four of them in the colony-proper, he'd probably have figured it was a large group of men anyway.

That didn't matter.

If Matty were dead...

Heero stopped by the door, listening intently.

"I didn't...I..." Matty was whispering.

"Shut the fuck up," someone snarled back.

Heero narrowed his eyes. From what he could tell, Matty was upset...very upset.

"Don't stand there!" Matty protested a little louder. "If they come in they could..."

"Why do you _care_ if they shoot me!?" the man snarled back.

...that was a pessimistic view, wasn't it?

Heero nodded slightly to himself...and swung into the room, leveling his gun at the man's head.

The man's weapon was aimed directly back at him.

"Max!" Matty cried, jumping up from behind a large metal table.

There was blood on his face...it had dripped down his chin...and it was on his hand.

The heat came back...it had receded mostly, but he felt it burn along his nerve-endings again as he looked around to Timorre.

"Oh! Don't!" Matty stumbled over the top of the table to jump in front of Timorre. "Don't shoot him!"

"You think he wouldn't shoot you?" Heero demanded, looking him over again. The motion had started the blood flowing again, and Matty looked about ready to bawl as he pressed his hands to his face again.

"Matt, get out of the way," Jaden hissed.

"No!" Matty protested, turning back to look at him. "If I move he can shoot you...or you could shoot him!"

"That's the point, idiot," Jaden snapped back.

"I can't just grab you and leave him here," Heero noted pointedly. "I can't leave him behind me."

"You can't kill him!" Matty swung back to Heero in alarm, wiping his hands on his pants again. "Max..."

"You can drop the act, Matt," Jaden noted darkly. "I know who he is."

"What?" Matty asked, turning to look back at him in confusion. "What do you mean?"

The man looked him over in confusion a moment before looking back to Heero.

"I haven't told him my name yet," Heero noted.

"You haven't?" the guy receded very slightly to blink at them.

"I didn't," Heero agreed. "He only knows me as Max."

The man receded a bit more, looking back to Matty.

"What are you talking about?" Matty demanded of him, wiping at his face again.

"What were you lying about? What have you lied about to me?" Jaden returned.

"What? Lied?" Matty wiped at his face again. "It was my friend War who bought me pax...and Max said they were coming for me."

"For you?" Jaden asked, looking back to Heero.

"The instant he was taken from that port," Heero said very quietly, "was the instant we decided to act."

"We?" Timorre repeated, licking his lips and looking back to Matty.

"And...and...I saw your name on my phone," Matty added quickly, looking apologetic. "And he talked to me last night before I went to bed."

"So you _knew_ this was happening?" Jaden demanded of him.

"He knew that I could see who touched his phone, that I could turn it on no matter where I was, and that I had said I'd come for him," Heero noted, moving forward so he could close the door behind them.

He didn't think they needed anyone else in the room to liven things up.

"You're really his boyfriend?" Timorre demanded blankly, looking Heero over.

"We've only known each other a week or two," Heero noted, not moving his eyes away from the man at all. "But at this point, I figured that's a safe assessment."

Timorre looked to Matty again, then sighed and lowered his arm.

"I'm sorry I lied," Matty muttered sincerely.

"Clean yourself up," Jaden returned, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and tossing it to the teen.

"I can't leave you here," Heero noted as Matty started wiping at his face. "You know that, don't you?"

Timorre smiled slightly at him and raised his weapon again. "I can't let you go."

Matty froze, looking between them.

Heero moved forward slowly, realizing the man had given himself up as lost. He didn't so much as twitch at the motion.

Matty turned into Heero's arms, clinging to him as Heero wrapped his free arm around the other. He returned the kiss very briefly, looking up to Timorre again.

"I can't just let you go," Jaden muttered, though he still hadn't moved.

"You _can't_ kill him," Matty whispered.

"I can wound him," Heero reassured his friend.

"Not the knees," the man looked alarmed at that thought.

"It'd be the extent of..." Heero started.

"Kid! Tell him not the knees!" Jaden protested, glancing at Matty.

Matty turned to give Heero another alarmed type of look.

Heero sighed in exasperation, pushing Matty aside. He moved across the room to stand at the end of the man's gun, staring into his eyes.

"We're fucked, aren't we?" Timorre muttered, studying Heero's face.

"I don't know, and I don't care," Heero returned, raising his weapon. "I'm here for one reason, and one reason only...and I just got it," he gestured at Matty.

Timorre's expression turned confused...as Heero swung.

"Max!" Matty protested...as Timorre's eyes glazed, and he slid to the floor.

"I didn't hurt him," Heero retorted, turning to give Matty a dirty look. "He might have a slight concussion, but he won't be conscious for a while."

"Are you sure?" Matty demanded, moving forward and reaching helplessly for the man, stopping before he actually touched him.

"Yes, I'm sure," Heero retorted, shifting the guy so he was laying properly on the floor and closing his eyes for him. "Fairly sure, anyway."

Matty gave him a look...then launched into his arms. Heero returned that kiss a little more eagerly, crushing the younger man to his chest as he listened intently.

"I was so scared," Matty whispered. "I had no idea what was going on at all and no idea why they were holding us..."

"Hostages," Heero returned, pulling away and moving quietly to the door. "It's a complicated situation."

"Are there...are there many of you?" Matty muttered, following closely.

"Many? No," Heero grinned at him. "It's just us five..."

"But all those explosions!" Matty protested.

"Yeah, War and Rige like making things go boom," Heero returned. "Jason's at the port, keeping the shuttle secure. If anything happens to me, you go there."

"Happens?" Matty demanded, his eyes rounding.

"Yes," Heero retorted, then moved back to the unconscious man on the floor. He took a moment to strip off his Kevlar jacket, tossing that to Matty. "Get that on," He suggested, fixing the man's shirt and patting him down for his radio. He wanted to see what sort it was, because that would give him a clue to the deeper security of the whole colony.

Matty pulled the Kevlar on uncertainly, shifting slightly as it hung loosely around his body...then noticed something. He plucked at the chain, pulling it out of the inside...and realized it was dog tags.

"Here," Heero muttered, moving up to him and starting to tighten the random straps. "I know it's not a great fit, but it should keep you safe...you need to stay _with_ me the entire time. We have to get to the port...remember, even if I fall, you go. I can get out of this if I'm not dead...I want you safe."

Matty stopped, then raised his eyes to Heero's uncertainly.

"My name is Heero Yuy," Heero noted, touching his cheek. "I was one of the Gundam pilots during the wars."

Matty stared back at him.

"They called me zero-one," Heero added quickly, kissing the other briefly. "Ready?"

"I guess," Matty muttered, looking back to Jaden again uncertainly...and stopped.

"What?" Heero whispered, he'd almost opened the door.

"Jason," Matty returned, meeting his eyes. "He's Quatre Winner, isn't he?"

Heero flashed him a grin and nodded, focusing back on the door out.

They could have that full conversation later...this really _wasn't_ the time for it.

- -

Quatre dropped the last man by the others, looking around. He'd set up a partition with a metal table so the wounded men at least had a _chance_ of not getting hit by stray bullets. He'd also taken their weapons and had them sitting near the door to the shuttle. He had a feeling there were a few of those hostages who would know how to wield them...and want to.

The helpless thing didn't go over too great with _any_ man he knew.

That seemed in order...

He turned and darted back toward the shuttle, noting that the air-tanks had filled. He shut that off and sealed it before disconnecting the machine from the port itself. There were safety seals enough that the men who would inevitably be chasing them shouldn't be in the lock-area. All he'd have to do was open the doors and hit the launch button and the port would do the human-safety precautions it was designed to accommodate.

There was a step behind him, light.

Quatre stopped, noting a few things all in the same moment.

That wasn't a familiar footstep, and the person himself wasn't someone Quatre knew. Also, he didn't think enough time had passed for the others to have _gotten_ their hostages, and the only person it might be in that circumstance was Heero...or Matty himself.

Quatre turned slowly...and froze.

He was looking at the business end of an old-fashioned revolver.

- -

"Clear!" Wufei snarled as the last man who'd been shooting at them fell. He darted forward, watching up the hall intently as Trowa covered his retreat. They hadn't heard any explosions for a few minutes, and he was hoping against all hopes that this didn't mean Duo was dead or wounded.

"Hey!" Duo's voice came from behind, and Wufei turned to see that he was, in fact, alone.

"Hey, you really alive or is this your ghost?" Trowa demanded.

"Not entirely sure yet, that last explosion wasn't me, it was a shot aimed at me," he flashed them a grin. "No word from Heero?"

"Nope," Wufei agreed, moving carefully into the room with the hostages.

They were all in the far corner...with metal tables around them.

"They sure have a lot of those tables around," Trowa muttered, blinking at them. "You think it was on purpose?"

"Metal tables are so cliché for decorative purposes," Wufei muttered, putting on an almost British accent. He looked the room over speculatively. "It does _nothing_ for the décor."

"You're an idiot," Trowa muttered, shoving him aside as he moved to look down at the terrified hostages. "Hello, ladies and gentlemen. We'll be your rescue-crew this fine bright morning...and as such we'll have to ask that you do as we say and not panic."

"I want to say we have donuts," Wufei added happily as he spotted a bar along the far wall, "but I see they provided better...and we don't have any anyway."

Duo snorted at them, looking the people over as they started standing slowly, uncertainly.

"_Move_ people!" Wufei snapped. "We ain't exactly here for a leisurely stroll!"

"Ah, the soul of civilian conduct," Trowa purred to Duo.

"Let's go, people," Duo snapped, gesturing them up. "Stay in a group, stay at our backs...and save the questions for the ride back out!" He turned, starting for the door. "Rige, be so kind as to let Max'n Jase know we're coming?"

"Of course," Trowa purred sweetly, pulling his phone from his pocket as the people started moving around the tables almost uncertainly. "No time like the present to take your time _escaping_," he snapped.

None of them were going to earn their civilian-care merit badges this trip...they'd have to try for it another time.

- -

Ranger frowned as he saw a Kevlar vest disappear around the corner in front of him, but something about an open door in the middle of all the closed ones drew his immediate attention. He turned into the room carefully, looking around...before spotting Jaden laying on the floor.

He stared in horror before darting forward. The man's Kevlar vest was gone...and his dog tags...but...he was breathing.

"J?" Ranger demanded, touching his face, then feeling for a pulse. "J? Come on, wake up..."

He was quiet thoroughly knocked out, however, and didn't respond.

"Fuck," he hissed, staring at the man's communicator in disbelief before picking it up.

Why hadn't the enemy taken it? They'd found the boy...he could tell that they'd found that damn boy...

He hit the emergency button on the communicator, dropping it again and jumping to his feet.

He'd seen more of the vest than the person wearing it...which meant it was probably on that damn boy.

They were only just up the hallway.

He darted after.

- -

E/N: Aaand I'm putting up the last three chapters today.


	13. Chapter 13

**Thirteen**

"I'm not feelin' the no-answer thing," Trowa snapped, glancing up at Wufei.

"Don't worry about it right now," Wufei retorted, keeping to the side of the herd. The hostages were a good little flock of sheeps and were following Duo without even the slightest hint of hesitation.

He had a feeling they were going to catch hell from any form of military-ranked official when they got to the next colony, but at the same time, without hostages, the situation on 27 could be dealt with in a much more direct fashion.

They'd claim that, too, make it sound real pretty—they wouldn't much let on that they'd only gone because Heero's piece of ass was in danger.

…that was unfair.

Trowa grinned tightly at a man who had glanced at him.

Evidently, they'd sown enough commotion in the colony-proper that the remainder of the soldiers weren't thinking about the hostages that were slipping very smoothly through their fingers.

- -

"Oh no!" Matty breathed, moving forward and hovering over one of the soldiers that had been guarding the room. "Oh…Max…"

"Nothing to be done about it," Heero snapped, yanking him past the mess. He wasn't sure how many of the forms were just bodies, and he didn't want Matty to think of it, either. There were enough of them still breathing that hopefully he wouldn't think some of them could be dead.

"But…"

"But nothing," Heero snapped back, shoving him on. "We have to go, Matty."

Matty moved quickly to keep up with the other, biting his lips uncertainly. The siren had gone silent at some point, but there was so much going on that it hardly seemed like a noticeable fact—especially with the red lights flashing.

They'd taken several more turns, heading in a direction that Matty couldn't even imagine…when his left arm was grabbed from behind.

He yelped in pain, then horror as he realized that _Ranger_ had grabbed him.

The man laughed evilly, a wicked smile crossing his face. "I knew you were lying."

Heero had turned, and had his weapon pointing at Ranger's head…but he wasn't moving. He was staring at the man hard.

"Your phone, it's all wired up, isn't it?" Ranger hissed in his ear. "You knew that, and that's why you wouldn't…"

"You think that, too?" Heero purred in amusement. "You think we were plotting some big massive invasion?" he laughed coldly. "I still can't tell if killing you would be a violation or not."

Ranger focused on him sharply, narrowing his eyes…and tightening his hand.

Matty choked on a pained cry. The man scared him, and he couldn't seem to make his mind work beyond the immediate pain.

"You're right," Heero purred, studying the man's eyes, "it doesn't matter, does it? Legal or no."

"As if your superiors would give you shit over _me_ after the _massacre_ back there," he gestured toward the room they'd all been in.

"Superiors?" Heero asked sweetly, grinning slightly. "I think you have a misguided sense of reality here. We _have_ no superiors."

The man narrowed his eyes…and squeezed Matty's arm again.

Heero _moved_…and evidently Ranger wasn't expecting it, either, because as he fell back from the blow to his face he pulled Matty with him. They fell in a pile, and Matty scrambled, trying to catch own balance or find his footing…or _something_…but there were too many arms and legs around him…

Heero, though, had much more control than that, and allowed the teen to scramble as he struggled against Ranger's hands. Their grappling wasn't going to do much, though, until Matty got out of the _way_.

The teen found himself and darted out of the pile, falling against the wall more than not before pushing himself up to his feet again.

Heero snarled as Ranger's elbow slammed into his chest, catching that before the blow could be repeated…then dodged a knee. It was enough of a distraction for the other man to gain his control, and shove. They rolled, then rolled again, launching furious blows at each other's faces and chests.

Blood, sweat, and spit covered both of them, and Heero didn't even care to tell whose blood was whose. His stomach had clenched as tightly as his teeth. He was aware of snarling, but he wasn't sure if there were any words contained in it, and from what he could make out of Ranger's snarls, he doubted _he_ was trying to speak…

"Stop!" Matty's voice was scared but firm as he moved up beside them. "Stop it, now!"

Heero was going to ignore the guy and continue—there was something very satisfying about pummeling the man—but Ranger froze completely, his eyes focused up. The former-pilot glanced sidelong to see at what…and saw the nose of the gun he'd been carrying about level with his cheek and aimed at Ranger's head.

Even though Matty had never shot before in his life, the chances of him missing from two or three feet away were _very_ slim.

He sat up, wiping his mouth with his arm and the back of his hand, noting as he did so that the blood was thick.

"Let's just _go_," Matty muttered, glancing at Heero.

Heero looked back up to him, realizing he had tears down his cheeks—but his aim never waivered, not more than the shaking of his arms required.

"I'm going!" Matty snapped…and dropped the gun…to run.

Heero snarled, catching the weapon as he jumped to his feet. Ranger had his hands up and was staring at Heero in confusion. Heero started to back away, then pointed the weapon at Ranger again as the man started to move.

Ranger froze.

Heero spat a few choice curses and blood onto the floor between them, then turned to give chase.

Matty had no idea where they were or where they were going, and if he got too far away in the wrong direction, they'd all be screwed.

- -

"That's it, Colonel," Rab hissed as Quatre backed himself against the wall. "It's so good of you to cooperate without me having to speak my desires."

"How'd you find me?" Quatre returned easily, not overly bothered by the revolver. It wasn't aimed for a headshot, and unless it hit his knee, he'd be fine.

"Well, I just had this thought," Rab returned, his eyes bright as he studied Quatre. "My surveyors said that no one was coming toward the colony, and that no one seemed to be waiting outside of it. There were no signs of entry from here, but I should check on the men here to see if I'd lost it…and here you are. One lone blond idiot."

Quatre flashed him a grin at that. Rab had a tendency to spit blond jokes at him when he was angry with him—and that had happened many many times when they were all working together. "I know you haven't forgotten that I topped well out of colonel, Colonel."

The man sneered at him.

"Oh, that's right," Quatre purred. "_You_ were going for the star, weren't you?" Quatre smirked, then shifted back as the gun moved toward his face.

"Who sent you?" Rab snarled.

"Yuy," Quatre returned easily.

"_Who_ sent you?" Rab repeated, jabbing him with the muzzle.

"_Yuy,_" Quatre repeated, wondering if Rab was going to go into one of the fits that had earned him the name 'Rabid.'

"You expect me to _believe_ you?" he snapped, drawing himself up—this meant the weapon was lowered. He was staring at Quatre incredulously. He shook his head after a moment, then moved toward the door to the ship. "Secure the port!"

"Sorry, Colonel," Quatre muttered, gathering himself internally. "That's not the plan."

"What?" the man snapped, turning to look back at him.

Quatre shoved himself off the wall and slammed into the man's back. They fell forward onto the deck as the various soldiers stopped what they were doing to point their weapons at Quatre.

_This_ was more like it…

Quatre decided he'd been spending _far_ too much time with Maxwell.

He tussled with the man on the ground for a long moment, realizing that he was hearing something. Feet…people moving fast.

"Ready?" Duo demanded.

"Ready…" Trowa agreed.

"Right," Wufei muttered.

The soldiers started swinging around.

"Everyone get _down!_" Quatre shouted, then brought his knee into Rab's spine. For a moment he had the terrible feeling he'd broken it, but he could tell he hadn't more than _hurt_ the man. Rab was laying all but completely still, gasping around the incapacitating pain.

The soldiers half-turned back to him, then focused on the approaching trio.

Where was Heero?

Quatre ripped the revolver out of Rab's hand and threw it hard at a soldier's head…which made him drop his weapon in surprise and cringe down. It also brought the attention of one of his comrades to him.

He couldn't really blame them for that, revolvers weren't usually used as the projectiles…stuff _from_ one, maybe, but…

Quatre launched from the downed man at those confused soldiers…as the shooting started.

He had a feeling he was going to end up with a really large hole somewhere he didn't want it…like his head…but he wasn't going to go hide with at least forty-six innocent civilians who had no idea what was going on.

The fact that Marsh had only brought a handful of soldiers confused Quatre.

He knew the others were going to give him _hell_ for putting his weapon down…and he had a feeling he was going to truly and fully regret his hand-to-hand, since it seemed to be more hand-to-hard things. He more or less incapacitated another man…which cleared the way for Duo to back a few more up to the corner on the far side.

"Go!" Quatre shouted at the prisoners. "Don't step on anyone!"

"Go…go…" Wufei urged as Trowa started herding the people.

"I'll clean up," Quatre muttered to Trowa and Wufei. "Go keep it clear…"

"Right," Trowa muttered, disappearing. Wufei glanced between Duo and Quatre a moment hesitantly, then darted out to follow.

- -

Heero snarled, shoving Matty down as a shot flew a bit wildly above his head. He could hear noise ahead of them, too.

"I'll clean up!" Quatre shouted. "Go keep it clear…"

"Right," Trowa returned promptly.

Heero felt relief, knowing that he could turn now, and take care of Ranger once and for all.

He'd almost thought the guy _might_ stay down…almost.

"Go!" Heero snarled, shoving Matty toward the opening that Trowa had just appeared in.

"Rigel!" Matty cried, starting for him, then slowed as he realized Heero wasn't following. He turned back to the guy.

"Now!" Heero snarled, gesturing at him, but looking to Trowa.

Trowa flashed him a brief and brilliant grin, darting forward and grabbing the boy.

"You think you've got away now?" Ranger snarled, though he was hiding behind a wall Heero had already passed. He was aware that if he moved anymore forward, he'd be an open target.

"Well, we aren't quite _on_ the ship," Heero noted conversationally. "I can't think we're getting away until the ship gets sealed and launched.

"Rab's gonna…"

"Rabid can't really do _anything_ to us," Heero noted skeptically.

"Rabid is laying in the fetal position back there," Wufei noted, moving up to join Heero and look down the hall at Ranger, who was looking back at them blankly. "Blondie got'im in the back."

"Didn't kill him, did he?" Heero asked blankly. That idea was strange.

"Nah, I don't think he can _move_ right now, though…who is that? Oh…Ranger," Wufei studied the man's face with a brief smirk, then looked back to Heero's. "I can't tell which of you is worse off."

"It was a lot more satisfying than just shooting him," Heero noted, thinking about it. "Is that strange?"

"Not at all," Wufei reassured him, grinning slightly. "If you're done here?" he indicated the other man with his head.

"Yeah, let's get out of here," Heero agreed, starting to back away. Wufei followed, covering his retreat with a few shots in the general direction of the other man.

"We didn't decimate them, did we?" Heero added as he moved around the corner. Trowa was trying to force Matty properly into the ship and Duo was standing on one side with his firearm ready. Quatre was on the other side, his also ready, but everyone he was looking at was laying on the ground.

"I don't think so," Wufei muttered, turning to run properly with Heero toward the ship.

Matty turned to look at them, and as he realized that Heero _was_ coming, his entire mannerism turned lighter and he stood straighter, no longer pulling at Trowa…and then his eyes widened.

Heero shoved Wufei bodily aside as the shot rang out…another near-miss, then turned with his weapon ready as Ranger stopped in the middle of the isle, taking in the mess around the ship.

"Get on," Heero ordered Wufei, turning his gun on the soldiers in the corner who'd laid down their weapons. They were standing nervously, looking at their fallen comrades on the far side and looking at Duo.

"Right," Wufei agreed, backing away with his eyes on all the men.

Duo fell back as well, eyes on Ranger as the man noticed the soldiers in the corner, then to the men on the floor as Quatre and Heero started backwards toward the door together.

Ranger's eyes moved from the injured…and up to Quatre.

He stopped entirely as he realized what he'd been feeling the whole time.

It had been _him_.

Quatre smirked at the man, still backing off.

"The kid wasn't lying, was he?" Ranger demanded, his eyes hard.

"Only a very little," Quatre agreed. "Take it in good faith that you were right about his phone being weird."

"Huh?" Heero asked blankly, not following the exchange.

"He's got the same problem I do," Quatre noted, smirking wickedly at the man. "And that means that he can feel things that other people feel…and he felt us and our plans…he just thought it was as simple as the teenager lying." He flashed the man another grin, moving in front of Heero.

Heero knew they didn't have time to quibble over who was supposed to be covering their retreat. He turned and darted into the ship as Quatre stood there, staring at the man a long moment. The guy didn't know any of what he could do, but Quatre'd had practice, and while it would look to anyone else like they were just watching each other, Quatre was eating up the man's aura, memorizing it, testing it and tasting it so he'd be sure to recognize it if he ever came across it again…then he turned and slid into the machine, hitting the seal on the door.

Ranger was too amazed and confused to react as the seal closed behind the blond, not understanding what he'd been feeling at all. The seals locked and the ship started…

"Ranger?" Rab demanded. "Ranger?"

Ranger focused on his leader in confusion, moving forward to look him over.

"Get the damn medics, idiot," Rab hissed starting to move some. "Hurry!"

Ranger pulled his communicator out and made the call.

He wasn't sure what had just happened…and he had _no_ idea what would happen next.

One of the soldiers who'd put down their weapons shifted to the side.

"Oh, move already!" Ranger snarled at the group of them. Only about six, but still should have been enough to take out the men who'd been there already. "What is this nonsense?!"

"Don't get all cocky on us," one of the men snarled back. "Get down on your knees and pray to whatever god you trust that you're not _dead_. You just survived a Gundam pilot."

Ranger froze, realizing vaguely that his face was starting to throb.

"You look like shit," someone else noted, moving around and starting toward the downed men. "What happened to you?"

"How do you know they were Gundams?" Ranger demanded.

"Because we're not _stupid_," someone else spat back, moving around as a commotion started in the hall. "What happened to you?"

Ranger gestured after the ship. "I was trying to find that damn kid."

"What the hell just happened?" another of the men asked blankly. "Why did they just take back that transport? Where's their backup?"

"According to sainted-fucking-_Winner_," Rab snarled, having pushed himself up to a sitting position, "they _had_ no back-up."

The men looked around to each other.

"According to sainted-fucking-Winner," Rab added, glaring at the closed doors, "Yuy sent them."

"Yuy?" Ranger asked.

"You know?" Rab spat back. "He was the one mopping the floor with your _face_."

Ranger's eyes widened.

"Oh, god," Rab muttered, looking around. "Did he kill Timorre? Where is he? Timorre? _Timorre!_" Rab had his communicator out.

"He wasn't dead when I found him," Ranger noted, starting to move toward the exit. "He was unconscious, though."

"Go get him some help," Rab snapped, gesturing at him. "God…those bastards! Those _bastards!_"

The fact that the man had tears in his eyes spokes volumes to Ranger and the other soldiers, but no one responded to his accusation.

There was nothing they could do.

- -

E/N: And now onto the epilogue...


	14. Chapter 14

**Fourteen**

"I _know_ you didn't just go into a full-blown _colony_," Noin noted through the vid to Quatre with an amused look in her eyes, "send three pilots after the forty-seven prisoners...and get out _alive_, Quatre Winner. I _know_ that did _**not**_, in _fact_, just happen."

"No?" Quatre returned, grinning slightly. "So what _did_ happen, then?"

"We're working it out," Noin reassured him. "Sally's running some scenarios that include a running loop of you pilots...the only problem is that Yuy would have to show up in all of those, and there's no visual confirmation that he was present at all."

"Ah, huh," Quatre muttered happily, looking around the cockpit a moment. "I couldn't tell you...I _have_ been in this tub for nearly an hour now," he added, looking back to her. "I seem to need docking clearance to offload my passengers."

"A pleasure cruise, Mr. Winner?" Noin asked sweetly.

"I think Yuy's having one in the bathroom," Quatre noted with a smirk.

"What?" Heero asked from where he was sitting in the front row with Matty in his lap.

Noin guffawed. "_What?_"

Duo, who'd been standing off to the side, shifted forward to grin at the camera. "You didn't really think we came to play because we're just good Samaritans, right?"

"I suppose not," she agreed dryly. "Who, may I ask, inspired the siege of Troy?"

"That doesn't work, sweetie," Quatre muttered thoughtfully.

"This sweet little nineteen year old," Duo noted, grinning slightly.

Not only was Matty the youngest on the flight, but there were no females near his age at all.

"_What?_" Noin repeated in sheer disbelief.

"Stop gossiping!" Sally called from the background. "Winner, you're in some shit now..."

"Really?" Quatre asked. "You _have_ to mark the vigilante check-box? You can't like...find...some special circumstance to put us under?"

"You _are_ a special circumstance," Noin muttered dryly, sitting back and looking around with a sigh. "We got the clearance for the dumbasses don't we, Poe?"

"They just saved forty-seven civilians and are on a ship that's running out of fuel. What do _you_ think?"

"I think they have enough to get to 29, but not to the L-4 cluster," Noin retorted. "They have the oxygen for that though. I'm sure the nice L-4ians will let them dock."

Quatre smirked at her.

"Just bring the shuttle in," Sally suggested, ducking down to look at Quatre properly. "Be ready for the storm, Winner. Une herself is on her way here. Your shenanigans didn't get on the news, at least."

"But we tried so _hard_," Duo protested in amusement.

"Maxwell," Sally retorted in a playfully acerbic tone, "we're all going to thank you guys properly...but you did just pull some vigilante bullshit, so we have to put on the no-no face for any men who might start thinking of their own heroics."

"Heroism is overrated," Duo reassured her. "People start expecting you to have morals and all sorts of nonsense like that. I've never understood it."

She grinned back at him and turned away from the screen.

"Bring'em on home, boys," Noin muttered, starting to click buttons above her head. "See you in fifteen...oh, and by the way?" she met their eyes. "Don't hurt the people with guns."

She ended the call.

"She's a maddening woman," Duo noted, turning away from the vid screen and looking back at Wufei, who was sitting on the opposite side of the isle from Heero and Matty. "You think she's lost that prince yet?"

"I don't think you rate princely hotness to her," Wufei muttered back tiredly.

"She didn't notice my hair," Duo noted, focusing down on Quatre. "How did she not notice my hair?"

"Maxwell!" Trowa called from where he was toward the back of the ship, talking to passengers. "Come play stewardess for the nice people!"

"Yeah, yeah," Duo retorted, turning to move into the little storage area between the cockpit and the passenger seating. "If I have to."

- -

"Did she just say people with guns?" Matty asked, shifting out of the way when Duo moved down the isle with a ridiculously frilly apron on and a handful of drinks.

It made some of the passengers snigger, and he looked around proudly, asking after their thoughts on the thing in a way that made it obvious he didn't expect to be taken seriously.

"Yeah, she did," Heero agreed, eyes closed. "We had like..._no_ clearance to do all that."

"Clearance?" Matty echoed, studying the various bruises and gashes on his face.

"Yeah," Heero agreed. "We haven't been in the military for two years."

"So you're going to get in trouble?" Matty demanded, sitting up straighter.

"Oh, probably," Heero agreed. "I can't bring myself to care, though." He hissed, jerking away from Matty's fingers, blinking at the boy.

"That was a bruise?" Matty asked, blinking at him. "Sorry."

Heero snorted at him, raising a hand to touch the sore spot—actually, his face hurt...and his knuckles, and his arms.

"Sorry," Matty muttered, blinking at him a moment, then tilted his head and dug into his pocket.

"It's all right," Heero reassured him, then blinked at the white tube. It had a prescription label on it, but not much else. "What is that?"

"Anal...ge...sic, I think he said," Matty returned, testing the word slowly as it came from his mouth.

"Anal huh?" Heero demanded skeptically.

Matty started giggling and smacked him in the chest.

"Ow," Heero returned, shoving his hands away. "You're abusive...give me that."

"I am not!" Matty protested, though he did surrender the tube.

"Analgesic cream," Heero noted, giving the boy a skeptical look. "I didn't know it was possible to butcher the word that bad."

"Oh, shut up," Matty muttered, blushing some and snatching the thing back. "You allergic?"

"Nope," Heero returned, sitting back again and relaxing. "Cream me up, baby..."

Matty started giggling again, glancing toward Quatre, who was close enough to hear them, then down at Duo, who was busily amusing the masses. "We could...the bathroom's right there," Matty muttered.

Heero snorted. "My entire face is throbbing, and you're probably going to be examined. I somehow doubt your plan."

Matty snickered leaning forward to kiss him slightly.

"Quit it," Quatre muttered from the cabin. "If you don't, you'll start marking each other and that'll be a harder to explain in the exam room."

Matty started snickering more, pulling away to meet Heero's eyes.

"Did you just say you have analgesic cream?" Quatre added, moving into the little hall and looking at them. "You'll let me use some? My hands are throbbing," he showed them his slightly swollen knuckles.

"Go fly the ship," Heero retorted.

Quatre grinned at them, turning back.

"It's cold," Matty warned, having squeezed some of the cream onto his fingers. "Just to warn you." Heero focused on him to ask him 'what?', but the cold cream on his face cut that off as he jumped slightly. "Ooh, sorry," Matty muttered, stopping.

"Sorry, startled me anyway," Heero returned, relaxing again. "Go ahead."

"And don't take your time," Quatre suggested. "I get to start docking procedure in about ten seconds and you need to be in your seat."

"Why?" Matty retorted, turning to look at him blankly.

"Because armed men might come onto the ship," Quatre retorted, giving him a look. "You on his lap might give the hostage look another go."

"Oh," Matty hesitated a moment, then focused on his task.

Docking proved a very minor challenge for Quatre. He could fly all sorts of military transports, but the passenger ship was very slightly different—he was kinda glad no one was paying attention to what he was doing.

He spun around in his chair again, though, to watch as Trowa finished up his sermon—for some reason, _Trowa_ had taken point with the prisoners...Wufei would have been able to do it just as well, but there was no chance Heero could have with his face a mass of bruises and Matty in his lap. Duo had been playing co-pilot for a while, but Quatre hadn't really needed the assistance.

"So we're going to have a seat," Trowa added to everyone. "I know some of you have bags in here," he tapped the compartments that lined the roofs. "But the priority right now is to get you to safety. We don't want any confusion, so please don't just run out of the ship. Move in a nice orderly fashion. I'm sure there will be people here to meet you." He moved up and looked down at Matty, who was sitting directly beside Heero.

"What?" Matty asked uncertainly.

"I can't block you," Trowa explained.

"I'm gonna sit pretty here," Duo muttered, moving back into focus behind Trowa. "Thanks for flying air-rescue, we hope you choose us for all your rescue needs!"

That got the same subdued sort of laughter—genuine, but not overly loud.

He flopped down on the far side of Wufei.

"I get to take your bullet?" Wufei asked him acidly.

"Of course, you're a good friend," Duo agreed, patting his shoulder.

"Thanks," Wufei muttered dryly.

"So...our pilot here will open the door in a moment," Trowa noted, dropping onto his knees in the end seat of the front row. "And you'll be free to go."

"I have to go out?" Matty demanded, focusing back on Heero.

"You need to," Heero agreed, grabbing his hand. "Don't worry, everything will be fine."

Matty sighed, leaning over to kiss him.

Quatre hit the button to open the doors.

It took a long time, but not that long at the same time. The various passengers moved up the aisle and out...all but Matty, who wouldn't stand.

"You _have_ to go," Heero whispered, trying to shove him away.

It took a moment...or three...but finally, the teen did turn and move out the door.

"Matty!" the hoarse cry came from outside the ship, and Heero focused on the door in amazement...but it was silent.

"Any time now," Duo muttered, drumming his fingers on the chair.

"We should re-launch," Quatre muttered, "get some suits on, and go in the emergency entrance."

"It's just a button away," Wufei agreed.

"Well, shit," Heero muttered, rising slowly to his feet. "Maybe let's not do it the long way and face the fire."

"I don't like fire," Duo retorted. "It melts my hair."

That got him a brief grin, and the expression looked like it should have hurt.

"Fine," Wufei sighed resignedly, sitting forward. "Fine...let's go out there."

Quatre sighed as well, pushing himself out of his chair to follow.

There were soldiers surrounding the gate—and people. The former prisoners were grouped across the area the soldiers were guarding with family or friends. The lady Une herself was standing with crossed arms a ways away from the door, flanked by Noin and Sally, an impatient expression on her face.

Heero looked to them uncertainly as he noted the lack of weapons pointed in their direction.

...then applause.

"Yes!" Matty muttered to his father. "He came and found me."

Quatre was the last from the ship, looking around...as the clapping got louder.

Une looked cross, but not overly angry...and the soldiers definitely were _not_ pointing weapons at them.

Sally scratched briefly at her cheek.

"Well?" Trowa asked Une curiously.

"You did well," Une returned, not uncrossing her arms. "You'll be reprimanded, of course, but you did well."

"So we are getting taken in?" Wufei asked curiously.

"I'm assuming you'll follow me to the van, yes," Une agreed almost pointedly.

So...they weren't being arrested.

That was a start.

Matty was looking around, considering the situation a moment, then moved hesitantly across the open area, looking up to Heero, since the exit platform was higher than the main walk.

Heero smiled slightly at the guy.

"Mr...Yuy," Matty's father, Taofa, muttered, moving forward, his eyes considerate.

"Yeah?" Heero asked, focusing down on him.

The man stared back at him.

"I told him," Matty noted, hopping up to move into Heero's arms. "I told him that you told me."

"So...are you coming with me," Une muttered, "or do I have to arrest you?"

Heero focused on her in amusement as Matty leaned into him.

She blinked at them.

"We aren't good Samaritans," Duo noted, tilted his head at the pair. "You might also notice the state of Yuy's face and then look at us...to compare damages, I mean."

"Oh my god!" Noin gasped, stepping forward as she stared at him. "Your hair!"

Duo beamed at her.

"You get in a fight with yard loppers and lose?" Sally asked blankly, moving forward.

Duo flashed them both grins, then looked to Wufei. "Is Sally too old for me?"

Wufei considered the skeptical woman's face a long moment, then focused back on Duo and shook his head. "No, no I don't think she is."

Duo beamed at him.

Sally started laughing.

"You're not..._really_...with him, are you?" Une demanded, blinking at Matty.

"Yes, I really _am_," Heero retorted, frowning slightly at her—his face was nice and numb, and the expressions felt strange. He assumed it was the pain breaking through the numbness.

"And _that's_ why you stormed 27?" Une hissed in a fierce whisper as she moved closer to them.

"I'm sure you could have handled the colony bullshit just fine without our interference," Heero agreed darkly. "I was just pissed."

"So, of course," Une muttered, looking the teen over, "they chose you as their poster-boy, and damn Rabid let loose his hound." She rolled her eyes a moment, then focused on Heero pointedly.

"What?" Heero asked, looking around somewhat. "_What?_"

"He was telling _you_ that the guy's name was Ranger," Une noted, quirking an eyebrow. "And telling you the guy speaking was called Pan and that Rabid was really in charge...wasn't he?"

"How did you know it was Rabid?" Heero asked blankly, thinking back. He had only known initially because of Matty's phone.

"He was in the hostage room and ordering everyone around," Une shrugged. "Everyone deferred to him...and then we figured out that Rab came from Rabid. Good job, kid," she added, ruffling Matty's hair affectionately.

Matty blinked back at her.

"All right," she added, shoving Heero so he stepped down as she went up. "Can I have your attention, ladies and gentlemen!"

Everyone in the room fell quiet.

"I need our forty-seven," she gestured at Matty, "to come with us to the local office. We'll need you there for a while, I'm afraid, but we can work out the details there."

That got a mutter that wasn't quite a groan.

"We have a bus waiting out front," Une added. "Please...this way."

"Why can't we ride the bus?" Quatre muttered, glancing around nervously.

"Because I'm going to tear you a new asshole and don't want little ears to hear it," Une snapped back at him. "Do you have _any_ idea what a nightmare this has been? And our agent on 27 reported that you nearly blew _up_ that entire damn colony!"

"It was a few cars," Duo retorted, giving her an offended look.

Une rounded on him, her eyes flashing...and Matty shied slightly away.

She brought herself up short and took a long slow breath. "There was an oxygen tank, Brigadier Maxwell. And beside this oxygen tank was a fuel-tanker. That fuel tanker caught on fire...because of a few cars," the last was in a very level and pointed tone.

Duo sniggered, trying to decide why she'd called him by the rank he'd had before they left. "Oh, shit..."

She gave him a very long look, glanced at the boy, then turned and started away.

Heero followed instantly, then blinked and looked back as Matty caught his hand and scampered to keep up.

"Matt!" Taofa protested.

"I'm fine, Dad," Matty protested, trying to link his hand with Heero's.

"Matty," Heero reprimanded quietly, "you were just held hostage over night...and she doesn't want anyone hearing what she's going to say to us anyway."

"You just _stormed_ a colony to save me," Matty retorted to that, intertwining their fingers.

"I don't understand," the guy protested, moving closer. "Don't you want to see Wren or Li?"

"I have to go to the offices," Matty muttered back, giving him a confused look. "I'll be a few hours anyway..."

"But...they're at the buses," the man muttered.

Matty stopped and looked back to him.

"Who's Lee?" Heero muttered blankly. The name alarmed him, and he wasn't sure why.

"Li?" Matty repeated, meeting his eyes. "My little sister..."

"Lee?" Heero asked again, not understanding that.

"Lifon," Taofa explained, grinning very slightly. "And Wren is my brother."

"Go with them," Heero muttered as the group swept through the halls. "I'm sure she'll have us do one-on-ones, and I'll go find you when it's not my turn."

"But...you said you were getting in trouble," Matty protested.

"I am, but not as bad as I thought," Heero leaned forward and kissed him—then realized the man's father was _right_ there. He pulled away and smiled at the boy, shaking his head.

"Yuy!" Une snapped over her shoulder at him.

"The mistress calls," Heero noted dryly, pecking Matty's lips again.

"Mr. Yuy..." Taofa muttered quickly, stepping forward with an extended hand.

Heero shook it...and was pulled in a hug.

"Thank you...and I mean it. I really do."

Heero nodded as Une rounded on him.

"Go," the man suggested with a brief grin.

Heero spun, and jogged to catch up with the others before the dragon-lady blew fire and incinerated him.

That was a very weird mental image...he'd need to figure out _where_ he got it from. He glanced back at Matty, smiled at the pout, then focused on keeping up with his group.

It wouldn't do to piss Une off anymore; she'd had enough of that for one day.

**End**

E/N: Aaand that's Above You, I hope you enjoyed the show. Unfortunately, I hit a block in the sequel: Attempted Bystanding. I'm going to try to work through the plot of it today so I can get the second story up in fairly short order. I have an idea for a third story in this series, too, but I'll go into more detail on that with the second one...and hopefuly that won't take long to get through. Hope you enjoyed my story! Leave me a review, huh? Have a good one -Kye


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